The Things That Happen When Nightmare Gets Bored
by FantasticalFantasy
Summary: Nightmare gets Blood, Boris, & Ace to kidnap new foreigners-Tara, McKenzie, & Emma! They may find they were in just a little over their heads as these foreigners try to make sense out of Wonderland & its people & maybe even find love...? Or not
1. Victim 1: Tara

**YAY! Thank you for your patience; here is the first real chapter. Hope you like it! *that would be a hint to review *******

Victim #1: Tara

Tara took a deep breath, enjoying to cool autumn air. She was by a small lake on her school grounds, at a serene place hidden by the countless looming oak trees. Her private school, St. Luke's, was an honorary school for artists, named for the patron saint of artists. St. Luke's had a very beautiful campus. The campus had a large grove of oak trees with trails and paths for the students to enjoy at their leisure. Like many artists at St. Luke's, including Tara, were often inspired when isolated and/or close to nature. Therefore, the campus of St. Luke's had many hidden nooks and crannies hidden in the grove for people like Tara to discover them. Tara had found a few, but the lake was by far her favorite. This was especially so because she was the only student aware of its existence. Something like a lake usually would be a popular spot, but it was so far away from any of the trails, nobody else had stumbled upon it yet.

To accommodate for the artists at the school, St. Luke's had a strange school schedule to allow time for artwork that was not assigned from any class. Being an art school, all of the classes assigned art at least every once in a while for an assignment. Aside from this, there were many full art classes for students to take. This was yet another reason for St, Luke's irregular schedule. That way, students could take as many of the various art classes as they wished. Tara took a quite full advantage of this; she took the classes: advanced sketch, sculpturing fundamentals, advanced painting techniques, and home economics. Yes, cooking is considered an art. However, the class at St. Luke's was more concerned with the art part of it. Tara received extra credit if her creations actually tasted good, though. Luckily for her, she was and expert cook, but many of her friends direly needed the extra credit and couldn't quite get the recipes right. Home Ec also required sewing, a requirement that Tara fulfilled with costume and jersey design for some of St. Luke's companion schools: the St. Genesius School for the performing arts and the St. Sebastian School of Sports. Despite taking for electives, Tara's class schedule allowed for a lot of down time. She often spent this time by the lake, as she was now.

Tara reached into the messenger bag she had brought with her and pulled out a miniature painting canvas. Then she reached in and after digging for awhile, pulled out some paints and paintbrushes. Next, she even took out a fold-up easel from her bag and set it up. Tara's messenger bag was the Mary Poppin's suitcase of art supplies. Finally, Tara dug out a pencil from her pocket and began to sketch lightly on the canvas. She was sketching the oldest oak tree visible from her spot, but did not draw the scene around it. Instead, she gave it a new setting, turned it into something like a picture from a story book.

Tara heard a set of footsteps – two sets of footsteps – but did not turn around. She was too busy drawing.

"Looks like a fun onee-san, right brother?" one voice asked.

"Right. And boss says we've gotta find another onee-san, brother," an identical voice replied.

"Want this one?"

"Definitely. She's also pretty, so boss will like that. He might give us a raise!"

"Really? She looks like a pretty onee-san, but I can't tell.

While Tara wasn't paying attention to any of this, the twins Dee and Dum shrugged behind her as if to say, 'who cares?'. Dee and Dum walked up to Tara.

"That's a pretty picture you're drawing there, onee-san," Dee said.

Tara turned around to face the twins. They both looked around the age of twelve. They had short black hair, one with blue eyes, and another with red. Tara figured they must have been wearing colored contacts to be told apart. The twin with the red eyes wore red clothing; likewise, the twin with blue clothing was dressed in blue. She smiled at them and asked, "Oh, hello – are you here visiting your brother or sister?"

"Nope," Dum told her, grinning.

"We came for you," Dee said.

Without further warning, the twins lifted Tara up onto their shoulders. Turning towards the canvas, the sketch melted away to another picture, one that looked suspiciously like the Hatter Mansion.

"Time to go!" the twins chorused happily.

"Wait…what? No!" Tara protested.

It was too late. The twins carried Tara through the canvas. The trio instantly appeared at the front gates of the Hatter Mansion. Tara's eyes grew wide at this sight. She tried to ask how it was all possible, but she wasn't able to make a sound, save for a small squeak of helplessness. The twins grinned at each other and set Tara down. However, they still held onto her arms, just in case she was thinking about running away. The twins stared at her face, and then turned to each other.

"You were right, brother, she is pretty," Dee said.

"Maybe boss will give us a raise this time," Dum told his brother, ignoring the stutters and half-spoken questions from Tara, who at this point, was more than confused.

"Very pretty," Dee added, still inspecting his new foreigner.

Tara had black hair worn in two pigtails in front that fell a good half foot past her shoulders. Her pigtails curled slightly into a cone shape. She had a very light tan, and a few freckles. Her eyes – which at the time were wide with surprise and confusion – were a vibrant green. Tara herself was somewhat short, but that made it easier for the twins to drag her towards the mansion, which as of that moment, they were doing.

"Hey, wait! Where is this place? What happened to St. Luke's?" Tara protested, her voice rising as she asked each new question. She was trying to pull away from the twins, but to no avail.

A male voice yelled, "Hey, brats! Care to explain why you skipped out on your shift!"

Looking to the side, Tara saw that a man with somewhat long, orange-blonde hair had appeared by the gate they were now passing through. He wore a black shirt with a yellow sash design, and a black coat over it. The shocking feature of the man was his rabbit ears. They must have been fake, but they looked very real. Not to mention, Tara couldn't see any sign of real ears. She was sure that if she could look more surprised, confused, or shaken, she definitely would. His expression changed to that of surprise when his saw Tara.

"Did someone die?" he asked.

"Nope," the twins chorused, "She's our foreigner!"

"Huh?" Tara said. Of course, she was yet again ignored.

The man stared in disbelief. "But…what happened to Alice? Is she…" he gulped, "…you know, gone?"

The twins scowled at him. "Stupid newbie hare. We just got our own foreigner. Alice is still here."

The 'stupid newbie hare' then asked, "Then why were you able to get another foreigner?"

"Because Nightmare allowed it," a voice from behind said.

The twins turned around to face the source of the voice, turning Tara with them. Their grip on Tara's arms was still as tight as ever.

"Boss!" the twins chorused. They shoved the foreigner towards him. Tara would have fallen, but the man caught Tara before that could happen. The twins continued, still in unison, "We brought you a foreigner! Do we get a raise?"

"Yes, I can see that, and no, you do not get a raise," the man told them. Turning his attention to Tara, he said, "My name is Blood, and welcome to Wonderland."

Blood was, by any standards, hot. He had somewhat long black hair. He wore a cream colored shirt and pants with a long jacket over it. The jacket was also cream colored, with a yellow trim, and had the four suits of cards stitched along the sides. Blood wore a black hat that had the four suits of cards stitched across the top as well, and his hat also had roses ornamenting it. He carried a cane with a gem and a hat on top of it. _What's with him and hats?_ Tara thought. _And cards too?_

"Eh?"

Blood chuckled. "I'll let Nightmare do the explaining. Come on inside," he said, gesturing towards the mansion that stood in front of them.

Tara hesitated. She still had no idea what was going on, and just blindly following strange men into a large fairy tale-like mansion could not be wise in any way. Then the twins, somehow holding axes, pointed two sharp blades at her back. Then she decided that she wanted to live, and followed Blood and the man with rabbit ears inside.


	2. Victim 2: McKenzie

**Yay! Next chapter! This one's fairly long, don't 'cha think?**

**Before I forget, the names of all three of my foreigners and the locations of their schools are all ideas by Space Whales. Pretty cool ideas, right? *hint to read her stories* Seriously. I would have never thought of those awesome names.**

**Warning: I changed Peter's clothing a little bit. I might do that again, so don't think too much about it.**

**In case you're too lazy to put all of this together, my three foreigners all go to different specialized campuses of the same chain of private schools. The schools are primarily located in Europe, though they can be found all over the world.**

**If you like this story, which I hope you do, please also read my story "Lorina in Wonderland", which is a collaborative fanfic with Space Whales (mentioned above).**

**Also, questions, comments, and suggestions are all welcomed and appreciated.**

Victim # 2: McKenzie

"Good job, Ken!"

"Nice game!"

"Those serves were perfect!"

"Bump it, set it, spike it; that's the way we like it!"

"Hey, Kenny – nice win!"

"You rule the v-ball court!"

"Championships, here we come!"

The students cheered for McKenzie Caroline as the volleyball game ended. Though the St. Sabastian School of Sports had a stellar volleyball team every year, it was exceedingly exceptional this year, even by St Sebastian's standards. Leading the team was McKenzie Caroline as team captain as the team's trump player. She was a rare athlete, not only for her amazing talent, but for the fact that she had been captain for the girl's volleyball, boy's baseball, boy's soccer, and boy's basketball teams simultaneously, as St. Sebastian's had only one sports season for non-winter sports: the entire school year. She was also in track, but there weren't any positions on the track team as there were for the other sports. The fact that she had served as captain on three boy's teams earned McKenzie the nicknames 'Ken' and 'Kenny'. She was a campus-wide superstar already, though only at the beginning of her softmore year of high school.

McKenzie's school was one of many specialized schools spread across the world.

"Good job, Caroline. I expect to see you at practice tomorrow," her coach, Coach Ree, told her.

"I'll be there," McKenzie told him. She wouldn't dare skip practice - not so close to the championships.

McKenzie fought her way through the crowd. Being the team captain made her the center of attention, especially with her reputation. However, she somehow managed to slip through to the equipment storage room. Once inside, she let the door close behind her, blocking out the noise from outside. She sighed. The volleyball games themselves didn't take nearly as much energy out of her as the crowd did. She breathed a sigh of relief. She grabbed the practice volleyball with her name on it and returned to the gym/battlefield. McKenzie quickly slipped out of the side door, thankfully not noticed by many.

Once McKenzie slipped out the door, she was greeted by the bitterly cold wind. Even though it was only autumn at that time, St. Sebastian's location currently felt like how winters felt back at her home. The cold was both a pro and a con of attending a private school in Switzerland. On the bright side, so much snow and ice made for the perfect conditions for winter sports such as ice skating, ice hokey, skiing, snowboarding, et cetera. The winter sports were split up into sports seasons throughout the school year. The season was currently figure skating, so McKenzie was waiting for ice hockey. However, McKenzie wasn't sure if she'd ever get used to the cold of Switzerland.

The volleyball under her left arm, McKenzie began purposefully striding towards the outside volleyball nets by the basketball courts. In her opinion, the best place to practice was outside. This was because most of the other students preferred to practice in the newer indoor gyms. Yes, plural. After all, you'd have to be crazy to create an elite private school for young athletes and only have one gym.

Shortly before reaching the volleyball nets, McKenzie took a detour to the drinking fountains. As she bent down to drink, she caught a glimpse of her reflection in the shining metal. _Wow_, she thought, _I look way more worn out than I feel._ Her blonde hair was falling out of its ponytail, though the rubber band wasn't lose. _Must have fallen out during the game._ Her usual blue-green eyes had a dull gray shine to them, the light in them slightly dimmer than usual.

After drinking from the water fountain, McKenzie bumped the volleyball off her forearms as she walked towards the net. As the amount of volleyball practice that is possible as a solo activity is strictly limited, McKenzie decided to practice her serves. Which would help her practice running, anyway; she'd kill two birds with one stone. Not to mention, her volleyball uniform was a tank top with the school's name in fancy lettering and short shorts to allow comfortable movement around the hot gym. The uniform was designed by one of St. Sebastian's counterpart schools – St. Luke's, the France campus dedicated to artists. Apparently, fashion fit into the school's genre, and therefore, students from St. Luke's designed any kind of uniform used in any of the schools. There were about five of them, though McKenzie didn't know what they all were. The volleyball uniforms that year were made by a freshman at St. Luke's, which McKenzie found impressive. Her name was Tara Kennedy or something like that. But the tags on the uniform only had the creator's designer name on them, so they said "Plum" in fancy writing. No matter who designed her uniform, it was not exactly efficient clothing for that weather, even despite her tolerance to the cold.

Reaching the faded line marking the end of the volleyball court, McKenzie raised her volleyball in front of her, brought back her serving arm, and hit a clean serve right to the back left corner of the court - a perfect liner. The volleyball bounced away. McKenzie was about to start running after it, but she noticed it bounced off of a shoe. A gloved hand picked up the volleyball. McKenzie looked up from the ball to see who had stumbled upon her practice session.

Whoever he was, he had the strangest appearance. First of all, he was wearing a long red coat over a black shirt and pants, the shirt's collar poking out from the coat. His coat looked very heavy-duty, and even just heavy, with all of the buckles on it. He had light brown hair, and his face made him look like he was one of those people who weren't ever frowning. Just to prove that point, when he looked up and saw McKenzie, he grinned at her.

"Hello," the man called out to her cordially. He began to walk towards McKenzie. She took a step back. He was probably only a visitor, but for some reason, he gave off this creepy aura that made McKenzie wary of him.

"Hello," she replied, "are you visiting a daughter or son or sibling here?"

"Kind of, though I sure hope that nobody as young as me already has a child in high school. I'm not too much older than that myself."

"Oh. Sorry, I couldn't tell."

"It's okay. So, do you like this school – you know, with the extra programs and all?" He tossed the volleyball back to her.

McKenzie caught it. "The sports? Yeah."

"Sports?" he muttered to himself, his voice barely audible. "I could have sworn Nightmare said it was an art school. Oh well. I must have gotten lost again! Hehe, I think I know what it was. I thought I shouldn't have taken a right turn so soon at Germany!"

"Something the matter, sir?"

"No, no, it's nothing. I guess you'll do!"

"Hold on – what?"

The man ran up to her, and before she knew what was happening, picked her up bridal-style. "I said, 'I guess you'll do!' By the way, I'm Ace!" He told her, grinning as if he wasn't kidnapping a teenage girl. He began to walk somewhere.

"What's that supposed to mean?" she screamed at him.

"Geez, I'm right here. You don't have to yell."

"I'm aware of where you are, seeing as you are forcefully taking me somewhere!" she screamed at him again.

"Well, you're not going to do any good by yelling. We're almost there anyway. You know, Nightmare was very nice. He told me that I wouldn't have to try to find the hole, 'cause I'd get lost. So the hole is going to come to us so we can fall!"

"What the freak?" As the words were leaving the girl's mouth, she immediately felt herself drop. The crazy guy was right when he said that they'd fall down a hole. She wasn't so sure about the rest, though. She braced herself for the landing and shut her eyes.

But for some reason, it didn't come. They didn't land. McKenzie opened her eyes. They weren't falling down any normal hole. The walls of the hole were lined with shelves, books, cards, chess games, guns, and cups of tea. Sometimes she saw the occasional teapot as well. McKenzie was beginning to doubt her own sanity. Then she saw the light. It didn't make her feel any less insane, though. But it did make her doubt her chances of survival.

The light blinded her. It was a really bright light. For some reason - though it probably wasn't possible - the light was multi-colored. McKenzie and the crazy dude who called himself Ace only fell through the multi-colored light for a few seconds, though. Before McKenzie knew it, she was sitting down in the middle of a large room.

"What?" McKenzie asked no one in particular. She was confused. How did she get to sitting down? Why wasn't she hurt, especially after falling longer than should be possible in a hole on the ground? Nobody could blame her for being bewildered in her situation.

The room McKenzie was in was huge, to say the least. It had a definite heart theme, as the walls and pillars were adorned in various heart designs. Even the tiled floor on which she was sitting had tiny hearts. Despite the room's size, the room was fairly empty. Even though the place was covered in a million tiny little hearts, something about the décor and general atmosphere in the room made it feel very official, even somewhat regal. Looking up, McKenzie saw a large staircase leading up to a platform. On the platform was a large red throne, also designed with the heart theme in mind. However, the throne wasn't what grabbed McKenzie's attention. It was who was sitting in the throne.

A young woman sat in the throne. She looked so comfortable in it, and in her red and black heart gown, that it was fairly obvious that she was used to such as how she was at that time displayed. She had dark hair that was curled, and on the top of her head was a golden crown. She held a jeweled heart scepter. She was most likely a position of royalty or riches, McKenzie decided. She was probably rich. She was a beautiful person, well suited for the elegance she was positioned in, whatever that position might have been.

A _really_ strange man stood next to the woman. The first thing that McKenzie noticed about him was that he was wearing surpassingly realistic white bunny ears. _Crazy much?_ McKenzie thought. The man wore a red plaid vest under a white shirt and a red tie with a picture of a clock on it. He also had a golden pocket watch coming out of his vest pocket. The man had white hair to match his ears, but his face showed no signs of even being middle aged yet_. He probably dyed it_, McKenzie decided. Stranger yet, his eyes were red. Does this guy want to be a rabbit that bad? It seemed a little extreme to get color contacts to look like a rabbit, in McKenzie's opinion. _He's probably a friend of that Ace weirdo._

_Think of the devil, and the devil shall appear, right?_ Ace was standing right next to McKenzie, grinning like and idiot. _And cue the chaos_, McKenzie thought. She was getting a bad vibe from her situation.

"We did not call you here, Ace, nor did we ask you to bring anyone with you," the woman said in annoyance. From what McKenzie already knew of Ace, she didn't blame the woman for being short-tempered with the freak.

"Ace! Is that what I think it is?" the man with bunny ears exclaimed pointing at McKenzie.

"Hate to interrupt this moment of confusion," McKenzie began, "but can someone please tell me…" she was ignored, and cut off after she spoke that phrase with very loud arguing between the three others. So, she continued by screaming, "_WHO ARE YOU AND WHERE AM I?"_

Silence fell throughout the room. McKenzie could have heard a pin drop, and she wished that a pin had fallen, because at least that would have made some noise.

"That confirms it, Ace you brought a foreigner," the man with bunny ears stated sternly. "If you're suggesting that Alice can be replaced, I'm insulted. I'll never love anyone but Alice!" he declared proudly, stubbornly, and quite loudly.

"Our dear Alice is still here, idiot knight," the woman said.

"But won't it be great to have another foreigner as well?" Ace asked. He still hadn't removed that idiot grin from his face. "Think of all the fun we can have!" he exclaimed. "Not to mention, Nightmare let me!"

"We do not approve of you bringing foreigners here – especially without their consent, which we know happened in this case – but she is more than welcome to stay here. We will enjoy her company." The woman told Ace.

The woman's gaze swept across the room, stopping at McKenzie.

"To quickly answer your questions," the woman said, "we are Vivaldi, the queen of the Country of Hearts – that's where you are right now. We have taken a liking to you; therefore, you may refer to us as 'Vivaldi' as opposed to 'your majesty' or something of the sort. The man standing next to us is Peter White, the Prime Minister. We suggest you call him 'Peter'. And this deplorable man standing next to you-"

"Oh, she already knows who I am," Ace said, his grin widening. Then, much to McKenzie's surprise, he _frowned_ in confusion. "I don't think I know her name though…" he said.

"I'm McKenzie," McKenzie said, telling Vivaldi more than anyone else. "You can call me 'Ken' or 'Kenny', though. That's what all of my friends call me."

"Very well then, Kenny," the Vivaldi said. The queen glanced through a heart shaped window to see that it was pitch black outside.

Also noticing this, McKenzie asked, "How is it night already? It was noon back before a certain somebody-" she glanced angrily at Ace, "-kidnapped me!"

"Time does not exist here as it does where you are from. That is all we will say for right now. Seeing as Nightmare is the mastermind behind all this, we will let him explain the rest. You should get some sleep, though. Peter will show you to a guest room. There will be several nightgowns in the closet – you will be able to find one that fits. We will have your clothes washed for you, so just leave them at the foot of your bed. They will be ready in the morning."

With that, Peter showed McKenzie to a room, then left. McKenzie changed, then collapsed into the bed. She was suddenly far more tired than she had felt a minute before. She fell asleep quickly.


	3. Victim 3: Emma

**I wrote this chapter as quickly as I could. ****You're welcome. Sorry if there are errors, but I edited it when I was really tired, and was too lazy and impatient to wait for the next morning.**

**Anyway, to clear something up about the school names being patron saints, I just figured that would be a good way to name the schools, with their specialized focuses and all. I'm not Catholic, but I have an utmost respect for the religion.**

**Y'know, I don't think I'll ever write a really long chapter. I'm too impatient and ADHD for that, but I hope you enjoy my short chapters.**

**After reading this, you'll notice that I didn't mention that Boris has cat ears and a tail. That will all be explained later.**

**Questions, comments, and suggestions are still welcome and appreciated.**

**pasty face: Again, thank you for giving my story your time. It's very encouraging, but I think you already know that, being an aspiring writer yourself. I just want to thank you again. And yes, I agree: Ace is a creepy idiot! But that's what I love about him. **

**Sleeping Moon: I'm glad that you like my story, especially considering that you don't tend to prefer OC stories. I'll be waiting for chapter two of your story.**

**Kamai-Rui: I'm glad you liked my interpretation of Nightmare. I'm planning on making him get into all sorts of mischief *evil grin*. Just you wait.**

**And finally (this is taking a long time, isn't it)**

**Space Whales: THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! I'm really glad you like it. And if you didn't like my story, "Lorina in Wonderland" would be a really long fanfic to write with me, wouldn't it? And thanks for that advice. I do need to watch that word reusage, don't I? Well, I think I've pretty much fixed it for this chapter.**

Victim #3: Emma

Emma Black was at the theme park for a school field trip. Of course, it wasn't any normal field trip, because Emma attended the private school, St. Genesius's school of performing arts. The school was focused on acting more than anything else, but did specialize in performing arts as a general topic. Emma took classes for almost every kind of performance art, but she was primarily a musician. Field trips at St. Genesius weren't what anyone typically expected when thinking of the subject of field trips. St. Genesius field trips weren't "field trips" as much as they were performances. For example, this field trip was a week of free stay at the theme park's hotel in exchange for constant performances from the students during that week. It was actually quite a quite enjoyable event for the students, and it provided them with the necessary experience to be successful performers. This field trip was even more special than usual; the theme park was located in America – quite the commute from Japan, the performing arts school's location.

As a result of the many students present at the theme park, nobody had very many performances, and therefore, the students were free to roam the park for most of the time. Emma was busy pulling her roommate, Rina, over to every ride she thought looked fun. Which was most of them. However, sometimes, Rina had to draw the line. One of those times was when Emma insisted that the two of them go on a colorful ride with dishes on it: the teacup ride

Rina was not happy to find herself dragged into the teacup ride. Mostly because she was literallydragged - as in her best friend, Emma, hauled her over into a pink teacup.

"Emma!" Rina complained, "I told you - the teacups make me dizzy!"

"Yeah, right. Teacups make you sick, but you love going in extreme upside-down roller coasters," Emma retorted.

"Well, that's because they're fast! I like that feeling. But the teacups are just slow enough so it hurts my head!" Rina complained lamely. She was lying, and Emma knew it.

"Oh, come on! You just want to show off on the rides other people can't handle, don't 'cha?" Emma asked. She gave Rina's arm an extra hard tug just to make her point that Rina should ride with her.

Rina sighed. Emma was wrong about the showing off, but she was close enough. Rina gave in. "Fine, I won't complain so you can have your fun. Just don't try anything crazy with that spinning wheel, okay? That's what I'm worried about."

"Why?" Emma asked with a mischievous smile. Rina detected an evil glint in her friend's black eyes.

"I wonder," Rina mumbled. Emma didn't hear her. She was too busy waiting for the ride to start.

Looking around them, both Rina and Emma noticed that there weren't many small children on the ride. In fact, the only people who seemed interested in the ride were teenagers, like themselves – both girls being fourteen - and young adults. Emma's eyes momentarily narrowed in confusion, but she quickly dismissed any questioning thoughts. After all, she was at the theme park. She should be fully focused on having fun!

"This is going to be so fun!" Emma squealed.

"Yeah… fun…" Rina said, yawning between words.

"Oh, please, Rina – how can you feel tired here where there's so much energy and fun everywhere?" Emma exclaimed, referring to the neon lights and laughter surrounding them. It seemed like every ride was brighter than the one Emma saw before it. The lights stood out in the dark night, making them even prettier than they had an hour ago.

Rina didn't answer her best friend's question - she didn't have the time to. The ride started. The teacups started to spin slowly, gradually increasing speed. Using the wheel in the center of the teacup, Emma spun the bright pink teacup. As they spun, Emma took note of some of the other riders. Even though she had told herself that she would stay focused on having a good time, she was curious of why there were only older people on the ride. She also wanted to see how they were spinning their teacups, so she could see if their ways were any more fun than hers. She was Emma, after all.

As Emma's eyes scanned the other riders, a teenage boy caught her eye, only two years older than Emma and Rina at most. Emma thought he was…interesting, to say the least. It wasn't in that '_Oh my gosh, that guy is cute/hot!' _way, but his looks were definitely attention grabbing. That was probably due to his pink-purple hair. But that wasn't all that was strange about him. He had a small black, upside-down triangle below the one eye that wasn't covered by his hair. His eyes, by the way, were a light shade of topaz. _Completely normal_, Emma thought, _He looks very natural_. Emma also took notice of his clothing. Punk fashion – with a small twist. _Ok, maybe not so small._ Emma didn't recall ever seeing guy punks walk around with half-tops and skirts with shorts coming out from the bottom. That was just her, though. However, she had seen many punks with piercings, and he seemed to take the prize with his unique piercings. The boy was wearing fish bone belly-rings. He looked like a character straight out of a book, or the TV set, or a video game.

Then again, she couldn't really say that he would have looked out of place if he were a student at St. Genesius's. In fact, she had no guarantee that he wasn't a student at her school. He actually looked like would fit right in at St. Genesius's, though. Something about musicians and actors made them prone to creative fashion trends. Emma herself wore a black school T-shirt and a lime green cami lined with lace showing underneath. She wore jean shorts that reached halfway down her thighs. Covering most of the rest of her legs were striped lavender and lime green knee-high socks covered only partially by her black boots, which only covered one fourth of her calf. On her head, she wore a sparkly lime green beret; it's color was an interesting contrast to her dyed red hair. Emma's hair was naturally red, but she dyed it to make it even redder, and brighter too. Her bright hair also contrasted her dark eyes that must have been dark brown somehow, but nobody had never been able to see any color but black in her eyes.

While Emma was lost in her thoughts, the teacups had been steadily gaining speed. Seeing as she had been lost in her thoughts, the teacups were spinning quite fast. By the time Emma realized this – which took a relative amount of time – the teacups were spinning _very_ fast. Not expecting this, Emma's eyes widened. She turned to regard her friend. Rina was grinning and laughing.

"Okay, I've got to hand it to you: you were right about the teacups," Rina admitted to Emma.

Emma, who had just gotten over the initial shock of their speed, couldn't help but agree with Rina and laugh along with her. The ride was turning out to be far more fun than she expected. Of course, she loved almost every attraction in the park, so it wasn't all too surprising that she loved it.

The teacups spun even faster, and before the girls knew it, the surrounding theme park was only a bright blur before their eyes.

"You think this is safe?" Emma asked suspiciously.

"Don't ask me; I didn't drag myself on this ride," Rina quipped. However, she did think they were spinning dangerously fast considering that the only thing separating them from falling out was a short wall that ended as the rim of the teacup. Not to mention, there was an open space for entering and exiting the teacup. It didn't have a door that could be closed.

It got to the point where Emma couldn't stand to keep her eyes open, as she became too dizzy. So she shut her eyes, allowing herself to feel the speed. The ride, she found, was much more enjoyable that way.

Even after a long while, the ride still hadn't reached a steady speed. It was spinning faster and faster, the speed increasing at an even quicker rate than ever before. Emma squeezed her already closed eyes shut tighter.

The ride stopped abruptly. _Gee, thanks_, Emma thought. She nearly slid out of her seat as the ride stopped. She opened her eyes. In front of her was the strange boy she had seen earlier – the one who dressed like a punk. He was grinning at her good-naturedly. _He sure doesn't seem like a punk._ He seemed too nice – no, too happy to be a punk. Last time Emma checked, punks didn't tend to grin at all, and especially as genuinely as his smile looked to be.

"Wh-what?" Emma stammered, "Where am I?"

"The theme park," the boy answered, still grinning. Perhaps his smile was a bit wider, though.

"I wasn't at this theme park before," Emma said slowly, cautiously. She looked around at her new location. It was a theme park, or at least, it looked like one, but it was definitely not the one she had been at only seconds ago.

"Where am I?" Emma asked. "Wait – before you answer that, who are you?" she added.

The boy grinned even wider. _Is that possible?_ He reached out his hand to shake. "I'm Boris! Nice to meet you, Emma," he said cheerily.

Before Emma could ask how Boris knew her name, a man's voice interrupted.

"Hey, stray! Did you get the foreigner you were talking about yet?"


	4. The Hatter Mansion

**_Grrr, so short. I'm sorry I didn't write much in the chapter. A temporary writers' block, you see, and it's the kind that will take forever to pass if I don't just get this done with. Not to mention, this is in the middle of my English final. My teacher showed the class a power point on a type of persuasive essay we've never seen before, gave us our prompt, and said, "Now write that winter final!" like it was a piece of cake. It's not all too bad, but even writing this fanfic isn't as therapeutic as it should be. So in short, I'm being lazy. But hey, have a little sympathy. It's not easy to get a 4.0 grade with the classes I have._**

**Okay, rambling done. Now here's the super short chapter. Note the obvious cut corners. Again, I was lazy.**

**_Oh, maybe not the chapter yet. I almost forgot: questions, comments, and suggestions are still welcome. Also, I know Blood's personality has changed more than just a little, but that's 'cause of Alice. Not that he was broken hearted about the JuliusXAlice couple or anything, but still, she taught him a lesson (so to speak)._**

Hatter Mansion

Tara was seated on a plush couch opposite of Blood, the twins – Dee and Dum, as she had been told – and Elliot – which was the bunny-man's name.

"Tea?" Blood asked.

Tara realized that there was a silver tray on a coffee table between the couch she sat on and the man's gold chair - Tara was fairly sure it was made of real gold. On the tray was an assortment of cookies, a few empty teacups, and a teapot.

"No thank you," Tara answered tentatively. She didn't want to be rude. After all, those twins still had their axes in their hands.

Blood looked a little disappointed at this answer. "As you like," he said.

The room Tara was seated in was luxurious, but that was more of an understatement than a description. The few hallways and rooms Tara had seen into were all equally grand. It sure looked like these guys preferred the finer things in life. There seemed to be no theme to any of the mansion, except 'expensive'. However, most of what wasn't priceless jewels and rare metals had a color scheme of black and red. Which meant there was a lot of velvet and dyed silk.

"Where's that idiot incubus?" Elliot growled impatiently.

"You're the idiot," Dee told him.

"Yeah, stupid newbie-chickie-hare!" Dum added.

"Hey, it's not my fault Blood decided to fire all of the faceless servants!" Elliot defended.

"Speaking of which…" Dum began.

"…does that mean we can get a raise?" Dee finished.

"No, but you can get a paycut if you'd like," Blood answered calmly.

"No fair!" the twins complained.

Just then, a man – _I'm guessing that's Nightmare?_ – walked into the room. He had slightly longish silver hair, though it wasn't anywhere as long as Elliot's shoulder-length hair. He looked to be in his early twenties at oldest – way too young for his hair color to be natural. He was wearing a black jacket over a white shirt and tie. _What's with the hair dye color? Most people want to dye their hair so that it's not gray!_

The man looked in Tara's direction and smirked. "Yes, I am Nightmare. And about my hair – well, let's just say I'm special. The color is completely natural."

Tara's eyes widened as she stared at the man in shock. Glancing around at the others, she noticed that none of her companions were surprised with Nightmare's seemingly random outburst.

"Wh-how…" Tara began.

"Yes, I can read your mind," Nightmare said. "I told you I'm special, did I not?"

"…"

"Moving on," Nightmare announced, "there are some thing's you'll have to know about this place. This is the Country of Hearts, but you can just say 'Wonderland'. Isn't that easier? Yes, it is. There are different territories here in Wonderland. Here, the Hatter's mansion is the home of the Mafia. The amusement park is run by a crazy old man who thinks he can play a violin - if he ever offers to play for you, run. Also, there's the castle of hearts, ruled by Vivaldi. There's also the clock tower, but it's neutral in the power struggle, so it's boring. Did I mention the three other territories are in a power struggle? Well they are. But you don't have to worry about that – you're a foreigner, not from this world, so everyone will love you wherever you go. And you're in the game, so you'll have to stay here for a while before you go home. Have fun! I'll see you in you nightmares!" Nightmare chuckled to himself as he walked out of the room.

Tara was still silent. All that time, Nightmare had been rambling unintelligible nonsense.

"What was he talking about?" Tara asked.

"I guess I'll explain," Blood sighed. "I never should have expected Nightmare to use his brain long enough to explain your situation to you fully, anyway."

So it was up to Blood to explain the wonderful wonder world.

**_I told you I cut corners, didn't I? Yeah, but do I really need to explain Wonderland to you? I mean, you probably wouldn't be reading this if you didn't know._**

**_I won't be so lazy for the next chapter, I hope._**

**_Thank you for your time._**


	5. The Heart Castle

**I'M SO SO SO SO SO SO SO SO SO SORRY!**

**This chapter is more than late. I know. I'm still recovering from my English final. At least my English teacher has been taking it super easy on us for this last week before winter vacation. It was actually kind of ironic, because we were given worksheets that had word searches and sudoku puzzles, and so I played sodoku. In English class. Don't you think that's at least a little bit contradictory? I had lots of fun!**

**So anyway, that's not the only reason this chapter is late. Long story short, I started typing the story – and had this really cool dream for McKenzie going on – but then, all of my text just disappeared. I couldn't save it. I tried to rewrite it, though my first was the best. I'm really sorry about that. It discouraged me so much, it set me back about a day. And I only have so much time to work on this.**

**Thank you, dearest reviewers. You have a special place in my heart. I think it's right next to HNKNA. **

**And still, questions, coments, and suggestions are still welcomed. Remember: suggestions include both idea suggestions (I'll give you credit if you inspire me) and constructive criticism. I hope to hear from you!**

Heart Castle

McKenzie found herself floating in a vast expansion of colorful space. To put it frankly, she was in the realm of a five year old's crayon scribblings. Or that same toddler's mess with water color paints. Either description worked. Wherever she was, it was strange. The colors weren't all too pretty, just weird. At least, in McKenzie's opinion they were. After all, she had never had much of a proper apprieciation for art. She was sure that pleanty others would be awestruck with the beauty of the elegant swirling colors. _Then again, most people are crazy, to call this art._

_Thinking of crazy, how am I standing in mid-air? _McKenzie wondered. She had just for the first time noticed that there wasn't any visible surface beneath her feet. She couldn't feel anything, either. McKenzie also found that her feet were dangling, _so I'm floating, not standing_.

"Welcome, McKenzie!" a voice exclaimed from behind McKenzie, startling her. She whipped around to face the speaker. She didn't quite know how she had managed to turn around while hovering in the air, but she wasn't about to argue or complain about it either. The man standing behind her was dressed in a suit and had silver-ish hair. His distinguishing feature, though, was the eyepatch he wore over one eye. He spoke again, this time in an overly apologetic tone.

"Sorry. It's Ken, right?"

"Um, yeah. That's right," McKenzier replied tentaviely. Who is this guy? How does he know my name? And my nickname too?

"Very pleased to meet you! I'm Nightmare," the man said proudly.

"You're a nightmare? That makes absolutely zero sense_." Actually, he looks kind of nice_.

"Why, thank you!"

"Huh? Why'd you say that? I don't think I said anything nice to you, did I?"

"It's the thought that counts."

"What's that supposed to mean?" McKenzie shouted in frustration. He was confusing her and he knew it. She could tell by the smirk he wore on his face. He didn't even try to hide it.

"Well, how do you think I already know your name?" Nightmare asked, seemingly changing the subject. He spoke as if her wasn't talking to an infuriated teenage girl who had been the quarterback on several football teams. His tone of voice was completely jovial.

"That was going to be my next question!"

"How do you know my name?"

"Because you told me!"

"There you go; that's your answer," Nightmare told her.

McKenzie was practically seething. _This guy is so annoying!_ Immature sounded like a compliment when directed towards him. _Is he two or twenty?_

"For your information," Nightmare began, sounding offended, "I'm nineteen!"

McKenzie stared at him in disbelief. "How…" she began, struggling to find words to speak.

"Yup! I can read your mind! Isn't that nice?" Nightmare asked, reverting to what McKenzie figured was his usual self.

After taking the information in for a while, McKenzie finally spoke again, filling the silence. "And you're _sure _you're nineteen?" she asked suspiciously.

"Of course!" he exclaimed. After a while, he added, muttering, "Nineteen, seventeen, it's all the same."

McKenzie raised and eyebrow as her only response.

"So, anyway, there are a few things you might want to know…"

Nightmare, apparently, was able to work harder at explaining things properly when in his dream realm. After Nightmare gave McKenzie a clear exposition of Wonderland, McKenzie's dream – which she discovered it to be after she awoke – abruptly ended.

**Yes, I know this was short, again. I really should write longer, but I didn't want anything extra to happen before all of the girls know where they are. After that, the real fun begins. I hope. I think I didn't know what I got myself into when I made 3 OC outsiders. Yikes.**

**This is going to be a quite predictable fanfic, as many HNKNA fanfics are, but after I finish this one (which may take quite some time, or I may end it early), I'll write one less predictable. I know I might have made Nightmare a bit different, but his immature side is the most fun to use.**


	6. The Amusement Park

Merry Christmas in advance, guys!

I think this chapter is very BorisXOC, so I guess that's my Christmas present to Boris fans.

Again, sorry for the wait, but I think every chapter will have some sort of excuse, so I won't even bother giving one this time. It was mostly lazy butt disease, anyway.

**Is it just me, or is every time I release a chapter right when a wave of chapters come after it? I don't think I'll get many more readers because of it. **

**Again, thank you reviewers, and please keep reviewing. I still love questions, comments, and suggestions. That's not going to change any time soon. **

Amusement Park

"So then, why am I here?" Emma asked after a thorough explanation of Wonderland, where she apparently was, by a man who introduced himself as Gowland.

"Why else? Revenue!" Gowland told her.

"Say what?"

"Having a foreigner live here will increase the number of customers!"

"Woah, woah- wait. Who said I was going to choose to live here?"

"Well, who wouldn't choose to live at an amusement park?"

A grin spread across Emma's face as she thought about all of the fun she could have. "Good point."

Appearing out of the crowd, Boris said, "Great, so she's staying here?" Emma suspected that he had been trailing them, eavesdropping the entire time.

"I guess so," Emma said, a smile still tugging the corners of her mouth upwards. She was rapidly warming up to the idea of living at the amusement park. After all, Gowland had just finished describing his amusement park rides to her, and he guaranteed them to be extreme, even for her. That had Emma really psyched; she had never had any problems with fun.

"Hey, stray – take our foreigner on a tour of the park, would ya? Emma seems to have good taste for roller coaster speeds," Gowland ordered.

Boris grinned. "Sure thing, old man." He turned to look at Emma. "How fast can you handle?"

"I can take anything you throw at me," Emma replied smugly, almost challenging her companion.

Boris smirked. "We'll see about that," he told her, reaching for her wrist and pulling her in a decided direction for the first stop of the tour. Before they got far, Gowland cleared his throat to get the twosome's attention.

"Ahem," he began, "I'm glad you're excited about this and all, but Emma, I have a small favor to ask of you."

Sliding her wrist out of Boris's grasp, she walked back to Gowland to hear out his request. Noticing this action, it was Gowland's turn to smirk. He was going to have to watch that stray closely. The foreigner didn't even seem to notice this. Correction: he'd have to watch that stray _very_ closely.

"I understand that you attend a performing school, am I correct?" Gowland asked.

"That's right," Emma replied.

"What do you perform?"

"Anything, really. Though my focus is music. I'm primarily a guitarist and pianist, and I often have to sing with my instruments for performances as well. I'm not exactly the best, but I'd be lying if I said I hate singing," Emma told him.

"Perfect!" Gowland exclaimed.

"What's perfect?"

"I'd like you to perform a song every once and a while in the park. There are several stages, so you can perform on whichever one you feel like at the time. The performance can be broadcasted onto several screens throughout the park. It'll be nice entertainment, and practice for you. How does that sound?"

"That sounds okay to me, but the music will sound kind of simple without other music to back me up," Emma warned.

"Oh, don't worry about that," Gowland said as he dug into his pocket. He pulled out a slim metallic device and tossed it to Emma.

"What's this?" Emma asked as she just barely caught it. She inspected the device for a moment. Her eyes widened in shock. "Is this- " she began to ask.

"Sure is," Gowland assured her, nodding. The device was Emma's iPod. She had almost all of the harmony parts to all of the songs she had ever performed on it.

"This…will work," she said. "But how did you get it?" she asked semi-suspiciously, one eyebrow raised at the man.

"Nightmare," Gowland answered in a-matter-of-fact tone.

"The dream guy?"

Gowland nodded.

"Yup; that's right," Boris told Emma.

"I'll have a worker notify you two when it's time for your first performance, Emma. All of the speakers that can be hooked up to that music player of yours will be ready. But I'll give you some time to explore and choose your song first," Gowland said, already making big plans for the foreigner.

"Wait – I'm performing today?"

"That's right. Unless there's anything wrong with that…?" Gowland half-stated, half-asked politely.

"Well, I guess that'll be okay. I'll be ready."

"Perfect. Now have fun in my park!" Gowland told her jovially, waving and walking away, leaving the two alone.

Boris took Emma's wrist again and pulled her through the crowd, past several colorful and cheery attractions, ignoring her questions about their destination, until he finally stopped in front of what Emma could safely assume was a haunted house.

"How about this one?" Boris asked, gesturing to the haunted house.

"Trying to scare me?"

"Depends. Are you scared?"

"No, but aren't haunted houses better at nighttime?

"Touché. I guess we can come back later, but you're going to go in that haunted house," Boris told her.

"Deal. Is there anything we can eat before we go on a ride, though? Freaky transportation via magical teacups makes me hungry, I guess."

Boris smiled. "Okay, sure thing. Want ice cream?"

"I'd be crazy to refuse."

Boris began to lead Emma in a direction past the haunted house. Soon enough, the two arrived at a food court. Boris was walking towards a shop, but Emma pulled on his arm to stop him and get his attention. Boris turned to face the foreigner.

"What is it?"

Emma pointed to a girl crying on a bench, only about twenty feet away from them. She wasn't terribly young, though she looked to only be eleven at oldest. "I'm going to see if I can cheer her up," Emma said determinedly.

Boris opened his mouth to tell Emma not to bother, that the girl was only a faceless person, but then remembered that Alice thought in a similar way. He smiled at Emma. "Sure," he told her, "but I'll wait here."

Emma walked over to the girl and knelt in front of her. Emma peered through the hands that covered the girl's face as she sobbed. "What's the matter? Is everything all right? Where's your family?" Emma asked the girl as soothingly as she could manage.

The girl looked up at Emma in surprise at her kindness. "I was here with my friends," the girl told Emma quietly. She was so amazed at the pleasantness being directed towards her, she had stopped crying temporarily.

"Were?" Emma inquired.

"Yeah…but…long story short, I guess I just don't fit in with them." The girl looked up at Emma. Emma was able to see that she was faceless, but the rest of the crowd at the park looked the same, so it didn't faze Emma. Not to mention, Gowland had explained role holders and the faceless people of Wonderland to some extent, so Emma was prepared.

Just then, a man dressed in an amusement park uniform walked up to Emma and the faceless girl. "You're the foreigner?" he asked.

Emma stood up. "That's right," she said.

The girl looked up in astonishment. "You're a foreigner?" she asked.

Emma nodded and smiled kindly at the girl. Emma now knew what song she was going to perform. "Is it time?" she asked the worker.

"That's right," the worker said. He gestured over to the center of the food court to where a large stage completely decked out with all of the needed equipment had suddenly appeared. Out of the corner of her eye, Emma saw Boris jump back in surprise as he noticed the stage. Emma giggled quietly. Apparently this stage was new to him.

Gowland walked up to Emma. "You ready?" he asked.

"Sure," she replied. Turning back to the bench to regard the faceless girl, she asked, "What's your name?"

"Jewel," the girl answered tentatively, wary of the role holder that stood nearby. Everyone knew all too well about how quickly Mary's temper could flare if provoked, and it wasn't improbable for the Mafia to appear just at that very moment.

Emma nodded in acknowledgement as Gowland led the way to the monumental stage. There was a keyboard and several electric guitars and amplifiers for Emma to choose from.

"You can plug your music player in here," Gowland told Emma, showing her a plug that was hooked up to large speakers.

First, Emma grabbed a shiny bright blue electric guitar and lifted the strap over her head. She walked over to its amp and turned it on.

"I trust it's tuned?" Emma asked Gowland.

"It was tuned just five minutes ago."

"Great! Thanks," she told him.

"Turn the volume up all the way," Gowland instructed. Emma obeyed as two workers adjusted a microphone to her height.

As Emma turned on her iPod and scrolled down to the song she had planned, Gowland introduced her to the crowd. When Gowland stepped down from the stage, before Emma hit the play button, she addressed the crowd that had gathered. It was a respectable crowd. Emma guessed that Gowland had wasted no time spreading the news about a foreigner to perform.

"This performance is dedicated to my good friend, Jewel. Jewel, I hope you'll take these words to heart." Emma pressed the play button on her iPod, and began to play. She was playing "The Middle" by Jimmy Eat World. When it became time for the lyrics, she sang,

"Hey, don't write yourself off yet  
It's only in your head you feel left out or looked down on.  
Just try your best, try everything you can.  
And don't you worry what they tell themselves when you're away.

It just takes some time, little girl you're in the middle of the ride.  
Everything, everything will be just fine, everything, everything will be alright, alright.

Hey, you know they're all the same.  
You know you're doing better on your own, so don't buy in.  
Live right now.  
Yeah, just be yourself.  
It doesn't matter if it's good enough for someone else.

It just takes some time, little girl you're in the middle of the ride.  
Everything, everything will be just fine, everything, everything will be alright, alright.  
It just takes some time, little girl you're in the middle of the ride.  
Everything, everything will be just fine, everything, everything will be alright, alright.

Hey, don't write yourself off yet.  
It's only in your head you feel left out or looked down on.  
Just do your best, do everything you can.  
And don't you worry what the bitter hearts are gonna say.

It just takes some time, little girl you're in the middle of the ride.  
Everything, everything will be just fine, everything, everything will be alright, alright.  
It just takes some time, little girl you're in the middle of the ride.  
Everything, everything will be just fine, everything, everything will be alright."

It just takes some time, little girl you're in the middle of the ride.  
Everything, everything will be just fine, everything, everything will be alright, alright.  
It just takes some time, little girl you're in the middle of the ride.  
Everything, everything will be just fine, everything, everything will be alright."

As Emma played, she began to worry that her music wasn't what the people of Wonderland were used to, but was relieved when she finished and the crowd erupted in enthusiastic applause. Her song had been a success. She grinned at her audience from the stage. She could get used to this.

Much later, Boris finally tracked Emma down. "Great job," he congratulated her. "Now, please note that it is currently nighttime. Still up for that haunted house?" he asked.

Emma smiled as he took her wrist again. Of course, being as oblivious as she was, she thought nothing of it. "Scared?" she asked.

**So, how was it? Tell me if I'm portraying anyone wrong. Oh, and please listen to the song Emma sang. It's on of my favorites. **** I apologize for a lack of grammar in the lyrics, but they're **_**lyrics**_**. Lyrics aren't exactly the epitome of proper literature.**


	7. A Haunted House and a Mouse

***evil laughter* you want to know what happened in the haunted house? I won't tell you! But I'll give you the next best thing: Pierce.**

**Yes, I know I said I wouldn't include him. I lied. **** Just kidding. I still probably won't add the Jokers, but I couldn't resist putting Pierce into my story. I just love the poor little guy too much!**

**Also, isn't Nightmare smart? I swear he could do his work easily if he wanted to! Have you noticed that Nightmare is behind almost all of the convenient things that just appear? I love him for that; he practically eliminates my need for foreshadowing!**

**Again, I love reviews, especially those with questions, comments and/or suggestions. I really do, so please don't hold back; pour all of your thoughts out onto that review page. Thank you to those who have reviewed, though, and especially thank you to those who have continuously reviewed.**

**All, my fans I'd like to thank! (I hope there are more people in that "fan" category than I know)**

A Haunted House and a Mouse

Boris grinned triumphantly. "You were _so_ scared," he announced jubilantly.

Emma blushed and looked down. "Was not," she muttered.

"Oh?" he asked, "Then what were you?"

"You startled me," Emma answered, her face burning red in shame.

Boris was silent. He was enjoying his glory too much to think of what to say next. His obvious joy didn't go unnoticed by Emma.

"And you can stop looking so smug," she scolded him.

"Sorry," Boris told her. Though he was still smiling, he looked genuinely sorry that he had made the foreigner mad at him. When Emma was silent, he added, "Hey, please don't be mad at me. Please? Forgive me?"

"I'm not mad," Emma lied.

"Come on," Boris said, pulling her away from the haunted house, already taking her to another ride. It was still nighttime. "I know how to make it up to you."

Before Boris could take her far, something bumped into them from behind, breaking Boris's hold on Emma's wrist. Boris always held her wrist; he didn't want her to feel uncomfortable, as he feared she would if he held her hand, so he settled for the next best thing. The something that crashed into them collided with Emma more than Boris, unfortunately for Emma, and knocked her down as it fell on top of her. As Emma tried to sit up, she became aware that the something that fell on her was more of a some_one_.

"Ow," Emma groaned.

A teenage boy – probably around Boris's age – scrambled off of Emma. Or was he a boy? He looked like a person, but had some very convincing mouse ears atop his head. After being teleported to a place that was home to many people without faces and where time apparently changed randomly (she had yet to witness that first hand), she wasn't so sure that the boy's mouse ears were fake. It certainly wouldn't be the craziest notion of the day. After all she'd seen and heard, Emma was tempted to find out what would happen if she said, 'Beam me up Spock; there's no life on this planet!'

"Pierce," Boris began, speaking to the mouse-eared boy. His voice was laced with annoyance.

"Ah!" the boy cried, hiding behind Emma immediately after hearing Boris speak. "Please don't hurt me, chu~! I didn't mean to, I'm so sorry, chu~!" he begged.

Without looking at Pierce – which was pretty impossible with him clinging to her shoulders like he was – Emma told him, "Don't worry, we don't blame you, right Boris?"

Boris glared at Pierce then looked down at his feet guiltily. "No," he mumbled.

Pierce only answered with a squeak of terror caused by Boris's glare.

"I won't hurt you," Emma said laughing. _He really is like a mouse, isn't he?_ she thought.

"R-r-really, chu~?" the boy asked nervously.

"Really," she told him soothingly.

"W-what about the scary cat, chu~?"

"Scary cat?"

"Chu~!" he exclaimed. Pointing to Boris over Emma's shoulder with a trembling hand.

"Oh, don't worry. Boris won't hurt you, either." Emma glanced over at Boris, expecting him to say something.

"For now," Boris mumbled. He wasn't too happy that Pierce had interrupted his time with the foreigner.

"Thank you, chu~! The scary cat is nice now! Pierce is happy, chu~!" the boy exclaimed.

"What makes you think that?" Boris asked.

Emma ignored him "So your name _is_ Pierce?" she asked.

The mouse nodded.

"I'm Emma," she told Pierce. Something suddenly dawned on Emma to add, "Why does Gowland call Boris a 'stray' and you call him a 'scary cat'?"

"Because he is, chu~!" Pierce told her.

"A cat," Boris clarified.

"What?"

"Did you think those mouse ears were fake?" Boris asked, pointing to the top of Pierce's head.

Emma was silent.

Boris smiled at her reassuringly. "There are people here with rabbit ears, too, so try not to think too much of it, okay?" he asked.

Emma smiled slightly. "Well, I guess Gowland _did_ tell me there were animal-like people here, but I never thought he meant in that way…"

Pierce now clung to Emma's arm. "And Boris used to have cat ears and a tail, chu~!"

"What happened to them?"

Boris grinned nervously at this question. "You see, I have this bad habit of getting into trouble when in sneak into the palace grounds… and one day, I just barely ducked out of the way of a guard's spear, and so one of tips of my ears was cut off."

Emma cringed at the thought.

"And funnily enough, the rest of the ear, the other ear, and the tail just went away. Disappeared. Like they were never there," Boris finished.

"You know," Emma began, "that's a story I could have lived my whole life not knowing."

"Oh, and have you shown her the Ferris Wheel?" Pierce asked Boris, completely off topic.

"Not yet, mouse, and when I do, you're not coming."

"Aww! Why not, chu~?"

"'Cause you're annoying!"

Before Emma could stop them, Boris was chasing Pierce. They ran all over the place, but mostly in circles. At least that way, they didn't get too far away. Emma groaned. It was a game of cat and mouse, and she was going to have to stop it. _Easy, right?_ All she had to do was restrain a cat from chasing a mouse. _Oh, who am I kidding?_ she added as an afterthought as she jogged to catch up with the pursuer and victim.

After about five minutes – which seemed like a lifetime to Emma, whose futile attempts to stop the two weren't going much of anywhere – Boris just happened to get an evil idea. Emma could tell he was scheming something just by the way his smirk widened as he chased Pierce. Before Emma could guess his plan, Boris put it into action. He chased Pierce into the haunted house, Emma running close behind.

The good news: the haunted house was being closed for the day, so any room past the last initial gothic room – which wasn't scary at all – was closed off.

The bad news: Their exit was also closed off.

"Boris," Emma growled slowly.

"Sorry," he mumbled. Even though the lighting was too dim to tell for sure, Emma thought she saw him hang his head in shame.

"Pierce, are you okay?" she asked.

"I think so, chu~," Pierce told her happily.

"Good. Now Pierce, I think Boris wants to apologize to you," Emma said, her voice demanding Boris to make amends.

"Sorry, scared-y mouse," Boris said.

"Boris-" Emma began. She was about to scold him, but stopped when Pierce spoke again, sounding oblivious to the insult.

"It's okay, chu~!" Pierce said. "Thank you, Emmie-chan!" Much to Boris's extreme annoyance, in order to thank Emma, Pierce kissed her on the cheek. Boris glared.

The trio sat in silence for a long time, Emma glaring at Boris, Boris sulking, and Pierce once again clinging to Emma's arm. When Emma finally figured they had learned their lesson, she stood up.

"Come on, let's go," she ordered.

"Go?" Boris inquired. "How?"

"It's locked, chu~!" Pierce exclaimed.

"Well then, it's a good thing Gowland gave me the keys," she announced, heading towards the door.

Boris stared in surprise. _She had the keys all along?_ He grimaced when he realized that if she had just told them from the beginning, Pierce wouldn't have kissed her. It just wasn't fair. He grabbed the corner of Pierce's ear and dragged the poor mouse out of the haunted house behind him. Of course, this was while Emma's back was turned.

**Oh ho ho ho. Boris is on Emma's bad side now! Am I going to have fun with this or, what?**

**Also, I was going to make Emma more of a fun person than a nice person, but I guess the character kind of took over control. ****XD**** You know what that's like, right? **

**I know, two amusement park chapters in a row. This is in fact leading towards the other foreigners, I promise. Just be patient.**

**Thanks for reading!**


	8. The Directionally Challenged Idiot

**I. Am. An. Idiot. The one time I actually succeed in completing chapters in rapid succession is the one time when almost nobody posts anything. Go figure. I guess I could hold the chapters until more people started posting, but I'm too impatient and eager.**

**Merry Christmas! I know it's still early, but I'm not sure that I'll get any more chapters done before Christmas. I might get one more chapter in. After that, I can't write for a few more days. I'm traveling to visit family. I hope you all get good presents, and I hope I get everything I asked for. **

**I'm not sure if I'm portraying Ace correctly, but oh well. If I'm doing something terribly wrong, just tell me. PLEASE REVIEW!**

"Where are you going, Alice?" Julius asked as Alice slipped out the door. He glanced up from his clocks to regard her.

Alice paused mid-way through the doorframe to turn and answer Julius's question. "I'm going to the store. Anything you need?" she asked sweetly. She really wished the man would just relent already and take a break from his work. _Like that's going to happen._

"Do we have coffee?"

"That's one of the things I'm going to get."

"Then I don't need anything," Julius replied, returning to his work.

Alice walked back to Julius's worktable. "Just don't push yourself too hard, okay?" she requested as she kissed him on his cheek. Though the man didn't look up from his work, he blushed slightly.

At that moment, Ace strode through the tower door. A furious-looking blonde girl trailed closely behind him. "You idiot!" she yelled at the knight.

"I got a little lost – so what?"

"A _little_ lost? You got a _little_ lost?" she demanded, "If I had known we were going here, I could have led the way myself! You can see this tower from the castle, and there's a _straight_ path leading here! How on Earth did you get lost?"

"Well, I wanted to save time, so I tried a short cut I know," Ace reasoned.

"A short cut doesn't exist! There is no short cut to a straight path!"

"Really?" Ace laughed. "I could have sworn there was…I guess I was wrong," he said. The knight shrugged as if getting lost for three time periods was no big deal. Of course, for him, it wasn't anything new. The blond girl glared at Ace. Ace smiled back at her.

Alice and Julius had been watching this exchange between the two when Alice finally interrupted. "Ace, who did you kidnap?" she asked pleasantly.

"Hey, that's cool Alice! How'd you know I kidnapped her?" Ace asked.

Alice's eyes widened. "So you _did_ kidnap her?" she asked.

Ace grinned. "Yup!"

The blonde cleared her throat in annoyance. "I'm McKenzie, the new foreigner," she said, introducing herself.

"But she said people can call her Ken or Kenny," Ace added.

McKenzie glared at him again. "That's right – call me McKenzie, Ken or Kenny. Whatever suits you. All of my friends call me Ken, though."

Alice's brows pushed into a v-shape. "Why would your friends call you that? Ken is a boy's name, isn't it?"

"Sure is," Ace said.

"I asked _McKenzie_," Alice told him.

McKenzie sighed. So Ace didn't act like an idiot to aggravate her – he was an idiot. Answering Alice, McKenzie said, "I play a lot of sports on boys' leagues, so the nickname is actually kind of fitting," she explained.

"You're good enough to compete with boys? What sorts of sports do you play?" Alice asked, impressed.

"Just about every sport. I'm good because I'm faster than most of the boys." McKenzie answered.

"Haha, that's funny!" Ace exclaimed. Whatever reason made it amusing to him was certainly lost on the girls as he received an angered stare from Alice and a blank stare from McKenzie.

"That makes no sense," McKenzie told him.

"Well, you see, you said you're fast, but I still managed to kidnap you!"

"That doesn't reflect on my running at all whatsoever."

Ignoring McKenzie, Ace changed the subject. "Hey, Alice?"

"What do you want, Ace?" Alice asked.

"You ask what I want, but to be perfectly honest, I want quite a few things, like I want-"

"Get to the point already, knight," Julius ordered. All of this fuss was giving him a headache. He wished Ace would just leave or do his job already. And since it was highly unlikely that Ace would do his job, Julius wished the knight would leave.

"So Alice," Ace began again, "the queen has me running some errands, but I don't know where to buy some of this stuff. In fact, I can't even read this handwriting. Help?"

"First apologize to Kenny for kidnapping her," Alice demanded.

"Why?"

"Because it's _rude_!"

"Haha! Sorry, Kenny-girl, but you're stuck here now!"

The atmosphere of the clock tower was pretty much filled with contradictory emotions. Alice's feelings – directed toward the knight – were adequately expressed by her fierce glare, earned by Ace for kidnapping a foreigner. Julius was muttering something about Tylenol and the idiot that wouldn't get out of his tower quite exasperatedly. Ace couldn't seem to be able to stop smiling and laughing like and idiot, and McKenzie occupied herself with watching Julius fixing the clocks between yawns. _At least this is slightly more interesting than watching paint dry._

Julius finally uttered something audible for the first time since Ace had walked into the tower; he called Alice's name.

"Yes?" she asked.

"Would you please go help Ace? He's giving me a migraine, and I can't work with him around. He makes too much noise."

"That's fine with me," Alice told Julius. Turning to Ace, she told him, "I was just going to the store anyway, so you're welcome to tag along."

"Great! Thanks a lot, Alice!" the knight said gleefully. "I even know a short cut! I'll show you!" Ace began to lead Alice in the direction of this so-called 'short cut'. It just so happened to be the opposite direction of the door.

"Um, Ace?" Alice began.

"What?"

I think we should take my route."

"Aw, why?"

"Because the door is that way," Alice informed him, jabbing her thumb behind her.

"It is? Oh, yeah!" he said, as care-free as ever. He spoke as if it had only suddenly dawned on him that he was walking further into the tower instead of out of it, which probably was the case.

Yet another intruder walked through the tower door: Peter White. McKenzie silently hoped that he had come to relieve her of directionally-challenged-knight-baby-sitting duty. Fortunately, he had.

"Looking as lovely as ever today, Alice," he greeted her. Then, regarding the knight, he was far less polite. "Idiot knight - Vivaldi said that if you're not back by four time periods with the items she requested, your head will roll on the palace floor."

"Haha, that's mean, Peter!" Ace exclaimed.

McKenzie noticed that most of the people she had met in Wonderland so far referred to Ace as and idiot.

The Prime Minister made his way over to where McKenzie was standing in the far end of the room. "Vivaldi also requested that you join her for tea, and in order to make it in time, you'll have to leave immediately."

McKenzie grinned in relief and happiness. She didn't know much about having tea with queens, but she'd gladly take it as an alternative to shopping with Ace. _Anything to get me out of spending the rest of the day with him_, she thought. She was really beginning to like Peter; he had helped her escape from Ace twice already. She was especially thankful for the first time, when Peter had showed her to her room. It didn't really sound like much of a save, but she was thankful for it all the same. She didn't think she'd be all too happy if Ace knew where her room was, even with his tendency to become lost. And now here he was, saving her again. McKenzie made a mental note to thank him later.

Peter took McKenzie gently by the arm and began to lead her out of the room, but Alice stopped them mid-way to the door.

"Wait, McKenzie."

McKenzie turned to address Alice. "Yeah?"

"Are you sure you're okay living at the palace?"

"Yeah, I'm just fine there, with the exception of a certain _someone_ who also happens to live there," McKenzie replied.

"The shouts of executions being ordered don't bother you?"

"I…haven't heard them. But if there really is someone who yells 'off with your' head all of the time there, I might reconsider my answer."

"Haha, you'd better reconsider, then," Ace told her.

Alice turned to Julius. "Can she stay here, Julius? Please?"

"I don't see why not," Julius told her. He was lying. Julius could think up plenty of reasons why the new foreigner shouldn't stay at the tower in addition to all of its other occupants, but he wasn't about to refuse Alice like that.

"Want to stay here?" Alice asked McKenzie.

McKenzie glanced at the knight, and once she saw Ace, she made her decision. "Please and thank you," she said.

"Alright; just make sure to talk to Vivaldi about it," Alice instructed.

When McKenzie nodded, Peter proceeded in walking her out the door.

"See you soon!" Alice called to McKenzie as they left.

When they had left, Ace spoke up again. "Can we go shopping now?"

**My plans may change, but as it is, I was thinking of writing one more chapter following McKenzie, then who-knows-how-many following Tara, and then I'll go back to Emma. Don't count on it, though. I constantly change my mind.**


	9. Tea With Vivaldi

**YES! **** Long-ish chapter! XD**

**It is far too hard for me to match up time periods between the three OCs, so I'm just going to pretend that the time periods can be different between the various territories. I don't know if that's right or not, but it's my fanfic. I'll change what I want.**

**Yet again, I thank those who reviewed, and humbly beg for more reviews. **

Peter led McKenzie through the gates of the castle as two faceless guards scrambled to open the way for them before Peter lost his temper in impatience and shot them. Luckily for the guards, Peter found their speed adequate enough to spare their lives, and didn't even begin to reach for his gun. This mild temperament might or might not have had anything to do with the foreigner walking beside him.

"Welcome back, Sir Peter," the two guards chorused in the mandated perfectly synchronized greeting to the Prime Minister.

Ignoring them, Peter led McKenzie past the gates and through several of the royal halls. McKenzie looked about her surroundings in awe. She suddenly realized that she hadn't yet had the chance to really look at the palace's interior. After all, when she had awaken in the morning, she had gotten dressed, been treated to a room service breakfast, then had been tasked with watching Ace on that diabolical shopping attempt. Vivaldi had asked this favor of McKenzie personally, and how could McKenzie have refused the queen, especially after Vivaldi had been so kind and generous? McKenzie now found herself feeling even more indebted to the queen due to the inexplicable timing that had saved McKenzie from the very task the queen had sent the foreigner on.

The interior walls McKenzie observed were no less exceptional than the throne room she had initially entered upon her arrival to Wonderland. The heart theme remained constant throughout the entire castle, yet nothing was similar to any other part of the rest of what McKenzie had seen of the castle so far. _They really didn't cut corners with their decorating, did they?_

Peter didn't give McKenzie much time to inspect every inch of the castle, as he walked with a purposeful stride. Of course, McKenzie was just fine with that. She could easily keep up with Peter's pace, and she still didn't have much of an admiration for art. In fact, she was already bored with paying attention to the royal décor. However, it was a big compliment to the castle for McKenzie to have paid the amount of attention she had to it.

Finally, Peter reached a large door and opened it. When the door swung open, it revealed the outside of the castle – a garden, which was dimly lit by a darkening sunset. _Sunset? It was noon just a little while ago… can the time here really change that fast?_

Peter gestured toward the garden past the door with a large sweeping motion of his hand, urging McKenzie to walk through the door. As she began to walk through the door, Peter spoke.

"I have paperwork that needs to be done, so from the queen, I must keep myself at a distance, until she forgets about those papers' existence."

McKenzie was surprised at the randomness of the rhyme, but ignored it and asked, "Where do I go to find Vivaldi, then?" As she spoke, she turned to face Peter, who still stood behind her.

"Just follow that path, and you'll find her soon enough. Have fun!" he called to McKenzie as he left her.

McKenzie turned to face the garden. After stepping outside, she shut the door carefully behind her. Quickly spotting the path – as when she had walked out, she had stepped onto the path – she began to follow it. _It's a really good thing this path only goes one way_, McKenzie thought. Going in the wrong direction and making Vivaldi wait even longer wouldn't be the greatest thing to do.

It only took McKenzie about a minute or two of walking along the rose bush-lined path to arrive at an outdoor tea table. The queen sat there, waiting for the guest. Upon noticing McKenzie's arrival, Vivaldi smiled pleasantly. Vivaldi beckoned the foreigner over to the table to be seated for tea.

"Wonderful timing, Kenny, dear," Vivaldi told her, nodding in approval. "We hope you enjoy tea, as our tea is unmatched anywhere in Wonderland."

"I do like tea, thank you," McKenzie said politely. She spoke the truth. It was almost a sort of ritual for McKenzie to have iced tea after every game. And she had missed her tea after the volleyball game (entirely a certain idiot's fault), so she was glad to have tea with the queen. Her family's influence was probably the cause for McKenzie's liking for tea. She came from a largely British family. Though she was sure her tastes weren't nearly as sophisticated as Vivaldi's. McKenzie made a mental note to be careful about that. She didn't want to offend the queen, after all.

"Splendid!" Vivaldi exclaimed excitedly, as much as a queen can exclaim excitedly and still keep her composure and image as royalty. "Today, we have black tea. We assume you are familiar with the taste?"

McKenzie felt like a dear caught in the headlights. Choosing her words carefully, and miraculously not stuttering, she said, "Well, I can't truthfully say 'yes', yet 'no' would also be a lie. I've tried all sorts of tea, and never tried a tea I didn't like, but I never bothered to learn the names of all the different kinds of tea." She was now especially appreciative for the inanely boring "tea parties" her various family members always held whenever she visited or there was a family reunion.

"Is that so?" Vivaldi asked. "In that case, we urge you to have some of our black tea. Considering what you have told us, we believe that it is probable that you will find our tea to your liking."

According to Vivaldi's wishes, McKenzie took a sip from the tea cup intended for her. Recognizing the taste, she smiled. "Oh, I remember this one; I've had it many times before," she told Vivaldi.

"So, Kenny, what sorts of hobbies do you engage in in your world to pass the time?" Vivaldi asked while she refilled her teacup.

"Sports," McKenzie replied. It was a general answer, but in her case, a specific answer was impossible. There were just too many sports McKenzie could play to name.

"What sports are there in your world?"

"Um, basketball, baseball, volleyball, American football, soccer/football… a lot of things that end with 'ball'. Of course, there are sports that don't end with 'ball', such as water polo, golf, and tennis."

"Oh? Are these fun? And would you explain a few of these sports to us?"

"Sure! Uh…" McKenzie began, trying to think of a sport that she had named that would be fairly easy to explain. For some reason, she decided that water polo would be the best sport to choose. Had she not been trying to think of a sport to fit the "easy to explain" criteria quickly, she might have actually come up with a sport that was easy to explain. Unfortunately, she didn't. As McKenzie tried to tell Vivaldi about water polo, she realized how complicated it really is, especially to one who has never even heard of the sport before. So after reciting the basic positions, regulations, and goal of the game, McKenzie noticed that Vivaldi was beginning to become confused. McKenzie decided to stop telling the queen how to play water polo, but still kept on the subject.

"It's really a brutal game, though," McKenzie told Vivaldi.

"Really? How? We thought you told us that attacking an opponent isn't allowed!"

"Well, it's getting caught by the referee that is really against the rules. Anything goes as long as no one sees," McKenzie told Vivaldi truthfully. She smiled smugly, remembering the dirty tricks she often used in water polo. "Kicking others' shins isn't just not unheard of; it's common," McKenzie added. She conveniently forgot to mention to the queen that she often kicked her opponents' shins herself. She was only very rarely caught. McKenzie had a strategy for this, which was to create such commotion in the water (waves, movement, et cetera) so that no one could tell what she was doing. Sometimes even the player she kicked wasn't completely sure about what had happened.

"We're guessing that there are all sorts of unwritten rules, then," Vivaldi stated.

"Pretty much. I've even heard of players using their toes to pants the Speedo's off of their opponents so the unlucky opponent will have to stop to put his swimsuit back on. Of course, this only works on boys."

"Such disgusting things take place? Ugh, we'd hate to play this game."

"Actually, the Speedo's thing is pretty legendary, but it doesn't happen much. I've only been told about it. Apparently, my uncle was really good at it when he played water polo."

"We hope you don't get hurt too often playing such a vicious sport," Vivaldi told McKenzie sympathetically, amazed that this "water polo" was actually a game to pass the time.

"Oh, no; I don't get hurt much. It's actually really fun!"

Vivaldi scrunched her nose, a look of contempt displayed on her face. "Again, we would hate to play such a game," she said. "We urge you to be careful in playing this game. We hate it when cute things get hurt; you see, we love cute things."

"And what does that have to do with me?" McKenzie asked, not understanding Vivaldi's words.

Vivaldi chuckled. "We'd hate for you to be hurt, of course! We think you are very cute, and we love all cute things," the queen explained. "Yet, we have to ask you to keep this a secret. After all, our image would be ruined if any of the other role holders were to know of this."

"I won't tell," McKenzie promised.

"Also," Vivaldi told the foreigner, "we know that Wonderland has many things to offer, and these things aren't always here at the castle. Though we will miss your company at the castle, if you wish to move to another territory, we won't object. If by any chance have you already received an invitation to live in another territory, we won't be insulted if you accept."

"I almost forgot! I was thinking of moving to the clock tower, because Alice invited me too," McKenzie said, suddenly remembering to tell the queen. If Vivaldi hadn't brought up the subject, McKenzie probably would have forgotten completely until who-knows-when.

As Vivaldi and McKenzie had been talking, Ace had been getting lost – again. Sure, with an infinite amount of difficulty, Alice had actually gotten Ace to the store. Yes, she had finally helped him navigate through the isles in the various stores Ace needed to shop from. Miraculously, she had kept him from wandering into the womens' bathroom while he tried to find the sugar cubes. Finally, a defeated Alice had guided Ace back to the clock tower and pointed Ace in the direction of the Heart Castle and had given him nearly foolproof directions of how to get there without stopping by the Hatter Mansion. Yet she couldn't stop him from getting lost. And stopping by to visit the Mafia. Eventually, though, Ace somehow found a route back to the castle: through the rose bushes. Those rose bushes just happened to be the ones that Vivaldi and McKenzie were drinking tea by.

"Oh… hi!" Ace exclaimed jovially when he emerged from the rose bushes and noticed the queen and foreigner.

"What are you doing here, insolent knight?" Vivaldi demanded angrily.

"Haha, don't be so angry! I bought you everything this time – even your milk!" Ace declared proudly as if he was announcing a novel achievement.

"We didn't ask for milk!"

"Then I bought you everything you wanted and more! See?" Ace asked, dumping the contents of his shopping bags on the tea table and setting the milk down beside it for Vivaldi to inspect.

"Where's the tea?" Vivaldi's voice had a dangerous tone to it.

"You asked for tea?"

"It was the first thing on the list. Half of the list following was the different kinds of tea we wanted. Ugh, if we could we'd execute you immediately, we could! Go annoy someone else, would you? Someone _not_ in the castle. We don't want you disrupting work."

"Haha, that's mean!" Ace said, speaking with a happier tone than anyone saying "that's mean" should use. Ace walked away, whistling a cheerful tune as if the queen who often ordered executions hadn't just been furious at him. "I'll be going somewhere else then!" he called as he walked away. He was walking in the direction in the castle.

"'Somewhere else' is in the _other direction_, Ace," McKenzie called back to him.

"Oh, thanks! That's a big help. See, I knew you didn't hate me!"

"Whatever you want to believe, Ace," McKenzie muttered as Ace walked past the tea table again, now in the correct direction. She was too tired to argue with him.

"McKenzie," Vivaldi began, gaining the foreigner's attention, "you may depart from the castle whenever you wish, as you don't have any belongings here at the castle to transport. We hope that you will choose to visit often."

McKenzie smiled. "Thanks, Vivaldi. I might as well leave before it gets dark, though."

Vivaldi nodded in approval. "That would be a wise plan."

Ace, who was busy trying – and failing – to climb over the rose bushes again, overheard this. "McKenzie's moving to the clock tower?" he asked excitedly.

"She is, and what of it, impudent knight?" Vivaldi asked.

"Oh, you see, I was going there too." Ace turned to McKenzie. "We can go together!"

"No," McKenzie deadpanned.

Despite McKenzie's stutters of protest, Ace took her hand and pulled her along with him. _Here we go again…_

**Just so you know, about that Speedo's thing, it's true. It's actually very common; my own uncle was an expert at it when he played water polo. In fact, my godfather was quite adept at it as well. Water polo is a dangerous sport. XD I don't play it.**

**That Ace buying milk thing was inspired by a youtube video: Ninja Melk. By the way, "melk" is supposed to be "milk", but I guess it's some sort of joke about Asian accents. Don't worry Asians; the creators of Ninja Melk are Asian. The youtube account it's posted under is nigahiga. Watch at your own risk.**

**XD**

**In case you were wondering, I **_**did**_** get what I wanted for Christmas. And more. **


	10. ExtraAnnouncement

Fantastical: *achoo* Hello! Long time no see!

Blood: *fake cheeriness* And just _whose_ fault is that, hmm?

Tara: That's mean, you know, Blood. Apologize.

Blood: No.

Tara: *murderous intent* Did you just say wh-

Emma: Woah there. *cautiously*Calm down, 'kay?

Fantastical: And what were we here to say, again? I forgot. *cough*

Blood: How did I see that one com-

Tara: *ahem* Blood, behave yourself. I know you haven't had much screen time (er, word time?), but that's not FantasticalFantasy's fault.

Ace: Haha, is the Mafioso upset? *points at self proudly* _I've _had lots of word time!

Boris: *brags* Not more than me!

Emma: Boys, boys! Stop competing! I'm sure FantasticalFantasy will try her very best to give you all equal word time!

Fantastical: Why thank you, Emma! I knew I made you a good character!

Emma: *beams* Thanks!

Fantastical: Now, seriously – what were we here to talk about?

McKenzie: Water polo? Y'know, I could teach you guys if you-

Emma: *eyes wide in horror* Heck no!

Boris: We're getting off track again.

Pierce: What were you going to say, Fantastical-chan, chu~?

Fantastical: *fan-girly squeal* So _cute_!

Dee and Dum: *cling onto Tara's arms* But aren't _we_ cuter?

Tara: *ruffles twins' hair* Of course.

Dee: And we're smart, too!

Tara: …?

Dum: Yeah! 'Cause it looks like we're the only ones who know why the heck we're messing around here and not being written into a fabulous chapter where we get to have lots of fun with our big sis, Tara!

Fantastical: Finally! *cough* And that reason is…?

Dee and Dum: You're sick!

Fantastical: *one borrowed grenade away from killing the brats* _Excuse_ me?

Emma: Oh yeah! Now I remember!

Pierce: You caught a cold, chu~!

Fantastical: *cough cough* Now that you mention it…

Tara: And a pretty bad one, too.

Fantastical: Which is why I haven't updated in _forever_. *blows nose*

Boris: *cringes* Wow, do you think you could have any more snot in that nose of yours?

Emma: *scolds* Boris!

Elliot: At least he's not that stupid, annoying Ace.

Vivaldi: We completely agree!

Elliot: Speaking of that moron, this lack of updating has a plus side, that being the fact that Ace hasn't shown up at the mansion gates in quite a few time periods.

McKenzie: It's a miracle!

Gowland: So then, as celebration, I shall perform a musical piece for you all!

_Music plays. "And I was like, 'baby, baby, baby, oh~!' Like, 'baby baby baby, no~!'"_

Everyone but Fantastical and Emma: *covers ears* No! The torture!

Fantastical: Oh, grow up. Justin Beiber isn't that bad. He just sounds like a little kid sometimes and a girl the others and can get very annoying at times.

Emma: *scolds again* Not to mention, it's rude to act like that when someone who I'm sure has practiced very hard plays for you!

Vivaldi: While we realize the importance of etiquette, we also recognize that in certain circumstances, it is nearly impossible. This is one of them.

Emma: *to McKenzie* So you can play the devious sport of water polo, yet you can't even listen to this.

McKenzie: Nope.

Ace: Water polo? I wanna try~! McKenzie?

McKenzie: Ask someone else to teach you, moron!

Elliot: And don't come to the Mafia for help, either!

Blood: Before anyone asks me, I fully intend to never wear Speedo's in my life.

Nightmare: Water polo sounds fun! To watch.

Blood: You'd die of blood loss if you played! No pun on my name intended.

Dee: If it was a pun…

Dum: Then it was a really bad one.

Blood: *One bullet away from requiring two new gate keepers * What did you say? Do you want to die? Or a pay cut?

Dee and Dum: *hide behind Tara* Nope!

Fantastical: So anyway, I've been sick for two weekends in a row, now. That's the longest I've ever been sick!

McKenzie: Lucky! I get sick a lot, and then wind up pushing myself too much, 'cause I hate being sick. And then I don't get better!

Ace: Haha, I wonder why.

McKenzie: *ignores Ace* Hey, I wonder where Julius and Alice are…? 

Nightmare: Oh, they're on a date.

Ace: Haha, that's going to be a disaster.

Tara: Why do you say that?

Gowland: Let's just say that Julius isn't very good at romantic stuff.

Boris: Like you're any different, old man.

Gowland: Actually, I am! You should hear one of my love songs…

Emma: I don't think anyone would appreciate that right now, Gowland. I'd be happy to listen to them later, though.

Fantastical: Umm, maybe we should finish what we came here to say pretty soon. We've spent almost three pages already.

Nightmare: What font size?

Fantastical: Ten. Courier New font.

Pierce: That's a lot for an announcement, chu~.

Fantastical: *squeal* Still so cute!

Boris: *evil-eyes Pierce* No he's not.

Pierce: *cowers in terror *

Emma: *scolds… again* Boris, stop it! You're making me sound like an old maid, with all the times I have to scold you!

McKenzie: I know I'm changing the subject – again – but… where's Peter? I haven't seen him all day!

Fantastical: *eyes widen in realization* Oh crud. I totally forgot to tell him about this. Being sick completely screws up my brain. And I've been sick at all the wrong times. Like I missed the tryouts for honor band. And I know one of the judges for the honor band, and she's my music teacher, and she said that I _so_ would have gotten in if I had tried out. And I would've gotten a good chair. But I was sick. I told you guys that.

Blood: Who cares?

Fantastical: *ignores* So anyway, updates will be slow. Even after I'm better.

Blood: *pulls out machine gun* _What?_

Fantastical: Behave yourself or I won't even let you appear for three more chapters!

Tara: *lowers machine gun for Blood and apologizes for him* He isn't really a people person.

Elliot: You'd better tell us why before anything else happens.

Fantastical: Right. You see, the other problem is English class.

McKenzie: Every problem in the world can be blamed on English class. The classroom is really a torture chamber. I hate it.

Emma: I rather like English…

Fantastical: To tell the truth, English class is both my favorite and most-hated class.

Nightmare: Even though I only know a little bit about your world, that doesn't sound possible to me.

Fantastical: It is. Most people who have my English teacher would agree. And I just barely saved my English grade from dropping to a C by barely finishing the rough draft of a seven paragraph essay in five days. The essay turned out to be about nine pages long. And I'm still not out of the fire yet. I've been getting _lots_ of work, so my break will also be prolonged due to my efforts to keep up my 4.0. But I still like the class. I know, this sounds like just a whole lot of excuses, and it is, but I thought I might as well justify myself. By the way, Nightmare, you sound a whole lot more mature today than usual. Are you alright? *cough*

Nightmare: Sure, I'm fine. If just been spending a lot of time lately scheming up plots concerning the three newest foreigners.

Tara: As if we're not in the room.

Emma: FantasticalFantasy, are you okay? You don't sound all too good…

Vivaldi: She is sick, we believe.

Fantastical: I'm pretty sure that's been stated before. *pops cough drop in mouth* But I'm fine for a sick person, I guess. These cough drops are practically candy!

Dee: And that's all!

Fantastical: No it's not! I'm terribly sorry, readers. And Space Whales, who I am writing a collaborative fanfic with (in case any of you actually managed to miss that I am also writing a fanfic called "Lorina in Wonderland" with Space Whales).

Dum: And _now_ that's all!

Fantastical: I guess it is.

Dee and Dum: Play with us now, Tara!


	11. A Job at the Mafia Mansion

**Even I'll admit that this isn't the greatest chapter ever, but I've been working on it for so long, what the heck.**

"So, I can stay here?" Tara asked.

Blood placed his hat on his head and grabbed his cane as he prepared to depart. Tipping his hat to Tara, he said, "Of course, young lady. I wouldn't just leave you with nowhere to go." He flashed his charming smile at Tara and left.

"Onee-san!" Dee called.

"We brought you the apron!" Dum finished.

Both twins ran up to the foreigner, proudly displaying a frilly apron that they had found in a closet. It had probably been left behind by one of the servants who had been fired. It seemed to Tara that Blood would have to be kind of stupid to fire everyone on his staff. Then again, how stupid could the leader of the Mafia be? She tried to ignore the red stains on the apron that looked suspiciously like blood.

Not wasting time, Tara got straight to work. It didn't take long for Dee and Dum to interfere with that, though.

"Onee-san! Can you play with us? Please?" the twins begged. They got on their knees and hugged Tara's legs as they pleaded with her. The restriction of movement the twins were causing was making it really inconvenient for Tara as she tried to cook carrot cake and cookies.

"I thought I already told you: I have too much work to do," Tara told them for what felt like the ten millionth time.

"Come on!" Dee and Dum whined. "At least play a video game with us!"

_They have video games here?_ "No, I can't. I really am sorry, but I can't just skip out on work!"

"Why not?"

"Because I owe this roof over my head to your boss, and I have to repay him somehow."

"Aww! Not fair!" they complained.

"Will you at least watch us play video games?" Dee asked.

Tara raised an eyebrow. "Do I have to leave the kitchen?"

"Nope!" Dum told her.

Dum reached for a remote that was on the bar counter on the other side of the kitchen counter. At the press of a button, a wide screen TV was automatically lowered from the ceiling.

_They have wide screen TVs too?_ "Okay," Tara relented, "what game are you going to play?"

"Halo Reach," Dee said.

"People play Halo in Wonderland?" Tara asked, raising her eyebrow again. That struck her as at least a little odd. Then again, these twins were odd. She was already getting used to it.

"Yup!" Dum answered.

"Boss says it improves our aim," Dee explained.

Tara sighed and continued mixing the orange batter in the large bowl. _Really, what did I expect from the Mafia? By nature, they shouldn't be normal. But in what ways should they be abnormal? Playing Halo doesn't sound like one of those "Mafia things"._

Tara wiped her hands on her apron and continued cooking. After a while, she completely forgot to watch the twins.

"Onee-san," Dum began in a complaining tone.

"You're not watching us!" Dee finished.

Tara realized that she hadn't. She had been too focused on the carrot cake. Now that the carrot cake was in the oven and the carrot cookies were cooling on top of the stove, she remembered that she was supposed to be watching the twins play. Tara leaned back against the kitchen counter. "Sorry 'bout that, guys. I'm watching now."

"Yay!" the twins chorused.

Tara watched Dee and Dum play the video game with growing amazement. They were good. It didn't occur to her that maybe little kids shouldn't be playing Halo enough to become that good, though.

After the twins had been satisfied that she had watched their gaming enough, Tara began to clean as she watched them. It was a little difficult to watch the twins play and clean at the same time, but she managed to work and satisfy the boys simultaneously.

Millions of Halo bullets and lots of cleaning later, Tara finally finished the day's work for good. She seated herself on a barstool to rest for a while. Her feet ached.

"Onee-san, would you like to play with us?" Dum asked sweetly.

"Um, I don't really play Halo, guys. But thanks," Tara answered. Halo was one of the few video games Tara didn't like to play. She didn't really know why, but she just didn't think Halo was all too fun. Metroid Prime, however, was a different story.

"We have other games!" Dee announced happily, "Will you play something else with us?"

"Sure. What other games do you have?"

Dee clicked another button on the same remote they used for a television, and a large crate of video games flipped out of a panel in the wall. _I have_ got_ to get one of those_, Tara thought.

"These ones!" Dum told her. He dragged the crate towards Tara and dumped its contents out near her feet.

Tara made no attempt to hide her shock on the boys' multitude of video games; her facial expression was amazed, bordering on worshipping.

Dee pulled out a video game case and presented it to Tara. "Do you like this one, onee-san?" The game he was holding was called 'Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem'.

Before Tara could make her response, Dum shoved a different video game in her face.

"But you like this one better, don't you?" he asked. He was holding a video game titled 'The Lurking Horror'. "This one was custom re-made, just for the Wii!" Dum announced proudly. He made an 'I win' face at his brother.

"Guys," Tara began, her tone warning them. It didn't work. Tara didn't even have a chance to make any threats.

The twins certainly seemed to enjoy not allowing Tara to fully respond to anything, because before she knew it, Tara had to separate the boys who had somehow conjured large knives out of thin air and were trying to kill each other.

…

"Do you really think that Tara can handle the twins all alone?" Elliot asked Blood nervously.

Blood and Elliot were heading towards the amusement park for negotiations. Of course, nothing would ever be negotiated, and the both of them knew that. It was still great fun, though, as Blood saw it. It was nothing but a waste of time that could be better spent eating Tara's carrot cakes, as Elliot thought. He was certain the foreigner would be a great cook.

Blood didn't answer. For one, he was busy thinking how to best insult Mary's name this particular visit. The second reason was that there was something making a strange noise. "What _is_ that?" Blood asked his subordinate.

**Yeah. Cliff hanger. And short chapter. Sorry about that. To tell the truth, I guess I just decided that it was time to finally post this chapter. I've been slowly and not-so-surely been working on it since December.**

**Anyway, all video games mentioned in this chapter are real. You probably at least recognized the familiar title of 'Halo'. So, yeah. The twins play video games.**

**I only have one sibling: an older brother. And video games are brother/sister bonding time for us, so I guess that's why I made the twins play video games.**


	12. The Mafia's Newest Guest

**You'll probably notice that this chapter is particularly short. That's because I wanted enough time to write you guys and extra special chapter for Valentines' Day, with an extra-special surprise. If the chapter turns out as epic as I hope it will, the only thing that will be able to top it is if your boyfriend or guy you've had a crush on for years gives you an "I love you" valentine and chocolates on an amazing date.**

"There, there," Blood said. He was crouched down by a tree at the side of the forest path, his arm slung around a crying girl's shoulders. He was trying to calm her down while Elliot just stood there watching. He couldn't help it; sure, Alice had softened him up a little, but this... this was very un-Blood-like. Then it dawned on him. The girl Blood was trying to calm down had a face, and he wasn't trying to kill her - she was a foreigner. Elliot wasn't all too good at discerning the difference, but he knew Blood was.

Five minutes later, Blood had finally managed to calm the supposed foreigner down enough to talk to her.

"Do you need any help?" Blood asked.

The girl shook her head.

"What's your name?"

"...Emma."

Where are you staying?"

Even though she was considerably calmer than before, she was still silently crying, and therefore, was very hard to understand. She said something along the lines of, "The...um...park."

Blood nodded and smiled at her when she glanced up at his face to see if it looked like he knew what she was talking about. As soon as she looked down at the ground again, Blood mouthed a cuss word.

"Is everything okay?" Blood asked. Obviously, everything was not okay with her, but he asked anyway. He figured he had a better chance of being confided in if he asked that instead of 'what's wrong?' It sounded less intrusive.

"Sure, I guess. I guess I just overreacted. You see, it started when Boris picked a fight with Pierce, and before I knew it, they somehow pissed of Gowland enough to start on a shooting spree, and I just couldn't take the immaturity anymore. Boris just can't stop acting childish!" Emma ranted.

Both Blood and Elliot looked at the girl in surprise. It wasn't every day Gowland went beserk.

"A shooting spree? Really?" Blood's pride was a little wounded. Up until then, he was the only one who had ever been able to set Gowland off on a killing spree.

"Do you want to stay at my territory until you're ready to go back?" Blood asked nochalantly.

Elliot looked at his boss questioningly. He wondered what Blood was thinking. Two foreigners in the mansion at the same time seemed a little over their heads to him. Did he want the twins to be even more uncontrollable than they already were? And having two foreigners meant they'd probably get dozens of annoying visits from the other roleholders every day. The mansion would practically be chaos. There was no way Wonderland would let the Mafia operate in peace with two foreigners staying at the mansion.

"You have a territory?" Emma asked.

Blood nodded. He smiled at her as if to show her that it was okay to accept his invitation.

"Then would it be alright if I just stayed until tomorrow?"

"Certainly," Blood answered. "By the way, you can call me Blood. And this is my subordinate, Elliot."

Elliot stared.

"Um," Emma began, nervously twirling a piece of her hair. For some reason, Blood was making her really skittish. "As I was running from the amusement park, I accidentally dropped my iPod on the way. Do you mind if I go get it first? It's just around that bend." She pointed in the opposite direction of where Blood and Elliot had come from.

Blood flashed Emma another charming smile. "Of course," he told her.

"Whatever," Elliot mumbled.

Blood ignored him, and Emma didn't hear, as she was already headed towards her iPod. Whatever that is. Blood couldn't remember everything about the other world.

"Why were you so nice to that girl? Even if she is a foreigner," Elliot asked, using Emma's absence as a chance to speak to Blood on the matter.

"She was crying."

"I don't buy that excuse."

Blood shrugged. "Well, also, for Tara. I did my research, and that Emma girl is her cousin... whom Tara is particularly fond of."

Elliot smiled in satisfaction. "Finally, the truth comes out."

"And you will be gentlemanly to Emma, also. You will make her feel at home at the mansion. Am I understood?" Blood ordered.

"Perfectly," Elliot answered, just as Emma returned.

Emma was holding a slim metallic device.

_Right_, Blood thought, _an iPod is a music player._

Elliot offered Emma his arm as an escort with a warm smile. Being charming was a Mafia specialty. "Shall we?" he asked.

Emma smiled. "We shall," she answered.

And super short chapter is finished! Next up, the clock tower, with a chapter for McKenzie!


	13. Valentines' Day at the Clock Tower

**Happy Valentins' Day! And single people, Happy Independence Day! Okay, here's my gift to you: the promised OC roleholder! Actually, there's two of them, just for fun.**

**I have been blessed with many e-mails from about all of you who added either me or my story to your alerts or favorites list. Thank you!**

**Also, I have 40 reviews! Isn't that great? XD Now, let's not stop here – aim for 70 reviews! XD That means… review, please!**

McKenzie was seated on a fallen tree while Ace sat on the ground. The duo was taking a rest after trudging through the forest. For hours, the path had been lost from sight and quite forgotten by the knight.

"Are you sure we're not lost yet?" McKenzie asked with a fake tone of brightness. Obviously, she didn't really need to ask.

Ace looked offended. He recovered his smile quickly. "Of course we're not lost! Have a little faith, would you?" He stood up and brushed of his uniform. "Let's go. We're almost there, you know."

"No, I don't know. And the first half of what we've traveled so far alone took more time than it does to reach the tower. How is it that I'm always stuck with you leading?"

"Because I know all of the short cuts," Ace told her proudly, "and this happens to be one of them!"

"This is a short cut?"

"Yup!"

"Oh. You see, I was under the impression that short cuts actually took less time than the normal route," McKenzie told him coldly.

Oblivious to her anger, Ace said, "Haha, what a funny notion!"

"Yes, funny."

Ace looked up at the sliver of sky visible through the trees' leaves. He grinned as he saw that it was beginning to darken.

"It's getting late," Ace said with his annoying trademark smile. "We'll have to camp tonight!" Out of nowhere, he had assembled a tent.

It took a moment for McKenzie to realize what he had said. Flustered, she yelled at him, "What the heck?"

"It's getting late," the knight said, "and Wonderland is dangerous at night."

"I don't care." McKenzie was determined to finally make it to the clock tower as soon as possible. She was more than tired of Ace's silly little games. "I'm leading, we are going to continue walking, and you will put away that tent," she demanded.

"But-" Ace whined.

"No buts!"

After Ace's tent had mysteriously disappeared to whence it came in the blink of an eye, McKenzie grabbed Ace's sleeve and began to drag him in a random direction. Well, the direction was random to Ace. McKenzie was headed in the direction they had come from; she figured they would eventually find the path again that way.

As McKenzie had reasoned, she was able to drag Ace back onto the path in five minutes of determined speed walking. When they were finally headed in the right direction, Ace tried to lead again. He pulled his arm away from McKenzie's grip and took her hand in turn.

"Oh, I know a short cut from here!"

Wrenching her hand from the knight's she immediately objected. "No more short cuts!" She began walking towards the clock tower, actually on the path, and determined to get there without straying from the path whether Ace got there with her or not.

…

"The almighty lord of this tower is here; you may all rejoice now!" Nightmare exclaimed upon his entrance to the clock tower's interior. However, his excitement was a little too much for his weak body, so he erupted into a coughing fit immediately after his declaration.

Julius sighed.

"Happy Valentines' Day, Nightmare!" Alice greeted him.

"Oh, but I didn't have nearly as much fun as you did, I am sure," Nightmare said, grinning at the young couple. But then his smile faltered. Nightmare turned to Julius. "You _did_ do something for her for Valentine's day, right? Or she gave you something?"

"No," Julius answered bluntly.

Nightmare groaned. Then he coughed up blood. Then he spoke in a frustrated tone. "Julius, I _talked_ to you about this several times! Valentines' Day is an important tradition for the people in Alice's world, a time for lovers to profess their love for each other by-"

"Nightmare," Alice interrupted. She held a hand up as a gesture for him to hold on for a moment. "Don't worry about it okay? I never really liked Valentines' Day anyway, and I don't need Julius taking a break from his extremely important work just to buy chocolates to prove that he loves me. I _know_ he loves me, and I _don't_ need him to prove it!"

After hearing this, Nightmare began coughing up blood again. When he finally recovered, he said, "That's really sweet, Alice. That clockmaker doesn't deserve you." Nightmare turned his attention to Julius. "Alright Julius, I forgive you this terrible offense, but only because your girlfriend is so heartwarmingly loyal."

"I'm _honored_," Julius mumbled.

"So where's Gray?" Alice asked, changing the subject.

"Oh," Nightmare answered, "he was temporarily reassigned!"

"So then who took his place?" Alice asked, worried that Nightmare had been left to act without the restraint of anyone else's better judgement. She was right.

"No one! I am S.O.L.O. now!"

Julius sprang from the chair at his work desk. "_What_?" he cried in horror.

Oblivious to the menacing, doom-filled aura that was quickly building in the room, Nightmare grinned. "Ergo, I am taking a vacation to my tower: this tower!" he exclaimed.

Alice smiled warmly. "That's great," she said. _After all, it _is _Nightmare's tower_, she thought, _and a little visit won't hurt one bit._

Apparently, Julius didn't share Alice's view on the matter, and banged his head against the wall, hoping that he would wake up from his nightmare soon. Nightmare was a nightmare - and a pain, too.

Turning to the door, Nightmare made a motion with his hand: one of those 'come on in!' gestures. "And I've brought a surprise with me… actually, _two_ surprises!" he announced.

Two people filed into the room, and from their faces, they were either roleholders or foreigners. "My cousins!" Nightmare proclaimed.

The first one to appear was only slightly shorter than Nightmare. He had chestnut hair that fell into his eyes, which were bright pink. He was wearing light gray cargo shorts and a forest green army print shirt. He wore a gun belt in a sash style. The gun belt itself was leather, and the bullets, painted bright pink. An annoying smirk was plastered on his face as he strode in and introduced himself. "What's up? I'm Cadell, the Knight of the Country of Pawns."

The second cousin to enter the tower was a good six inches taller than Nightmare. He had black hair with thin golden streaks, cut in a hairstyle that was similar to Nightmare's, though about two-and-a-half inches longer. His eyes were black. He wore black dockers and a white polo shirt. A golden string tied around his neck attached to him a long, flowing cape that covered his arms and a great deal of his shirt. It reached down to his calves. The cape was the same forest green as Cadell's shirt, and was adorned with several golden images of various chess pieces. The most abundant of these pieces was the pawn. "I am Johann, the king of the Country of Pawns."

"You mean Queen, cuz," Cadell teased.

"I am the king, but have the role of Queen," Johann clarified. He shifted his attention to Cadell. "Unnecessarily mention that I have the role of Queen while being male again, my dear cousin, and you'll be fish food for my loyal sharks."

"Sharks?" Julius inquired. He wondered if he could borrow them for Nightmare.

Johann nodded in conformation. "I heard that the Queen here in the Country of Hearts prefers beheading as a form of execution. Well, I prefer throwing those who I wish to dispose of temporarily into the shark tank."

"Nightmare," Julius said, "how would you like to swim with the fishes?"

Nightmare scowled, coughed up blood, then scowled again. "My cousin would _never_ do such a thing to me!"

"Keep dreaming," Cadell mumbled.

…

After Alice had provided Julius and all of the new residents of the clock tower with coffee or hot chocolate, the excitement – or for some, hate – in the room exhausted itself. Julius, for once, was taking a break from work; he insisted that he was taking a break because there was no way that he'd be able to concentrate with Nightmare and his kin's excessive chatter. Before long, he was cordially discussing ways to punish irritating dream demons with the fear of hospitals with Johann.

The door of the tower was, once again, slammed open. Ace emerged from the doorway, carrying McKenzie – who was either sleeping or dead - in his arms princess-style. Nightmare coughed up even more blood in shock. 

"Is she… why is McKenzie unconscious?" Alice asked, aghast.

Julius shot the knight an accusatory look.

Ace laughed. "Haha, don't worry! She's only sleeping. She was tired," he assured everyone. "I think all of her energy was used up from arguing the direction to get here, and so she was taking a rest. She closed her eyes and never opened them again for the rest of the journey here!"

"Oh… okay," Alice said. "I guess you'll have to carry her to her room, then. I guess any of the guest rooms will work." That idiot could be trusted to do something that simple, right?

Ace headed towards the door.

"_Other_ direction," Julius informed him.

"Oh, right. Haha, my mistake!" Ace began to walk through the hall to a guest room. "You know," he added, "Kenny here talks in her sleep sometimes. It's really funny!" _It's really cute…_

"Shut up," McKenzie mumbled in her sleep.

Somehow, Ace found one the guest rooms. That is, after discovering every other room in the house. He carried the still sleeping McKenzie to the bed, pulled back the covers, set her down gently on the mattress, and replaced the covers.

"Good night," Ace whispered in her ear. He kissed her lightly on the forehead, then chuckled to himself. _She'll never find out…_ He lied down on the carpet by his foreigner's bed and closed his eyes. Sleep came swiftly.

..**.Yeah. I'm not all too good at "moments", am I? Oh well. Don't like, don't read. But still review.**


	14. Almost Twins

**Happy St. Patrick's Day, everyone! I'm sorry that I haven't written for a while, but work overload has killed too many brain cells lately. This chapter would have been out earlier, too, but I rewrote a lot of it. I hope you like it! To be honest, I have **_**no idea**_** where I'm going with this story.**

**Also, for lent (Google it if you don't recognize the term), I'm giving up anime and manga. It's **_**killing**_** me. I usually refer to HNKNA manga to write my fanfic chapters, but now I have to do without. When I can have my manga back, there better be lots of chapters waiting for me!**

Blood, Elliot, and Emma walked through the front door of the Hatter Mansion to stumble upon a… most _interesting_ scene.

Tara's eyes were glued to the television screen. Her fingers were busy flying over the buttons and controls of a Gamecube game controller as she focused her attention on _The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time_. Both Dee and Dum were at her feet - literally - busy painting her nails with images of AK-47's and AA-12's on various rainbow-colored backgrounds. Obviously, there was a think layer of newspaper separating the nail polish from the recently cleaned carpet, but Dee and Dum didn't really need it. They were surprisingly adept manicurists and pedicurists. Tara's fingernails were already finished and dry - hence her ability to engage in gaming while she waited for the boys to finish with her feet.

Emma recognized her relative immediately. She let out a small squeak of excitement. "Tara!"

Tara set down her controller and turned to see her cousin. Her face lit up at the sight of Emma. "Oh my gosh! What are you doing here?"  
Emma grinned. "I don't know! But it's so awesome that you're here, too!"

"I'd give you a hug, but…" Tara said. She pointed to the twins.

"No problem!" Emma said in a delighted, bubbly voice. She bounced over to her cousin's spot, sat down right next to her, and gave her a hug.  
Tara laughed. "Did I really have to hint that much to get a hug from my own cousin?" she asked rhetorically. She laughed

"Sorry," Emma apologized as she laughed alongside Tara.

Blood cleared his throat loudly. "I'd hate to interrupt your touching reunion, but I have to ask. _Why_ are my gatekeepers… um… what are they…?" he struggled to find words for whatever the twins were doing.

"Giving Tara a mani-pedi?" Emma offered.

"I guess…?" Blood asked-stated. He was _definitely_ not used to being at a loss for words.

"Retribution," Tara answered. She had picked up the Gamecube controller again and was continuing Link's adventure.

"Retribution?" Blood inquired.

"They were fighting about which gun was better – the AK-47 and AA-12, both very fine choices, if you ask me – and got into a fistfight. I didn't mind the fight much, but then they got blood on the carpet. Blood stains are _so_ hard to clean, you know. So I made them paint my nails. A just punishment in my book," Tara explained without diverting her attention from the video game.

…

Boris paced at the front of the amusement park, muttering worriedly to himself. "Where is she…? Where is she…? Where is she?"

Gowland was going to check on the ticket sales. He also had to see about some complaints of a creepy punk teen who was pacing incessantly by the front gate of the amusement park. When Gowland arrived at his destination, he saw Boris there. Well, saw him there again. _That crazy kid's been at it for hours!_ Gowland thought."Take a break already," he called out to Boris, "I know you're lovesick, but your pacing isn't helping anything, and it's scaring the kids!"

…

"So you two are related – what a coincidence!" Blood exclaimed, pretending to be surprised. His act was eerily convincing. Elliot wondered what else Blood would lie about. It took every ounce of self-restraint Elliot had to remain silent.  
The mansion residents and foreigners were seated at a large table outside. They were supposed to be having an evening tea party, but Blood and Emma were the only ones drinking tea. Tara hated tea with a passion, and had opted for a latte instead; Elliot was enjoying the carrot pastries that Tara had baked for him; and the twins were eating oreos with milk.

"We're cousins, but we were raised together like sisters, so we're almost twins," Emma informed the roleholders after being asked.

Blood didn't believe that the annoying bundle of energy he had brought to the mansion was in any way similar to Tara, but he smiled and nodded all the same.

The group lapsed into silence after that. All except Blood found the silence unnerving and awkward, but none knew what to say next. Therefore, the twins became fascinated with the process of disecting oreos, Elliot began to take extra care admiring the decorative frosting applied to look like a carrot on his cupcakes, Emma found the sudden need to stir the sugar around in her teacup until it appeared to completely dissolve into the beverage, and Tara stared, enthralled, at the images in her latte* and then at her cousin and back again.

"Emma, are you alright?" Tara asked after a while. Something about Emma seemed... _off _to Tara, and she was driving herself crazy trying to figure out what it was.

"Yes," Emma answered slowly. "Why do you ask? Do I look sad or something?"

"Bingo. You also look like you've been crying," Tara pried. "Did something happen?" Tara turned to Elliot and Blood. "Do you know anything about this?" she asked them without giving Emma a chance to respond.

"It's nothing important," Emma said.

"You're hiding something from me, and I wanna know what it is," Tara told her firmly.

"Really! It's nothing," Emma assured her.

"Crying is nothing?" Elliot asked. He figured that Tara would want to know what had been happening about her cousin. And if Emma had been crying, he was sure Tara would want to address it. _It isn't that I care, but this is probably what Blood wants_, Elliot figured.

"Out with it," Tara demanded, "If that boy broke your heart, I swear-"

"No! No, no, no – that's not what happened. It has nothing to do with that!" Emma interrupted frantically. "Anyway, I should go back the amusement soon. It's getting kind of late; I guess I lost track of the time."

"An amusement park?" Tara asked, puzzled. "What?"

Blood stood up. "It's getting late. I propose an end to tea. I suggest that you don't travel between territories at nighttime, Emma. It's extremely dangerous." He picked up his cane and walked away without another word.

"Hey Emma," Tara began, "are you going to tell me what happened anytime soon?"

"Just some friends of mine being really immature and tiring me out, don't worry," Emma answered.

Tara raised an eyebrow.

"It's one of those things when you get really emotional over the smallest things, just because it's one of those days, you know?"

Tara wasn't sure if she quite bought what her cousin was telling her, but if there was something else, she wouldn't be confided in just yet, judging from the way Emma was acting. So Tara decided to forget it – temporarily.

…

Elliot walked to Blood's study, where he assumed his boss would be. Tara and Emma were wearing nightclothes from their world – which, needless to say, were courtesy of Nightmare – while eating popcorn, playing video games, and having more fun than he thought possible under the circumstances that they were somewhere unfamiliar and had no idea how to get home. At least, that's what the girls had been doing before Elliot had left to check on his boss a minute ago. Who knew what they'd find amusement in next? According to them, people in their world had fun just "sleeping over" at a friend's house, whatever that meant. Elliot had also in a brief period of time learned that in their world, people sing songs promising that they'll "never say never**". _What sort of song is that?_ Elliot had wondered, _And if they will never say never, why did they just say it twice?_

Elliot knocked on the door of Blood's study before opening the door, but didn't bother to wait for an answer before entering the room. When Elliot entered, he saw Blood sitting at his desk, talking to a visitor: Nightmare. Blood acknowledged Elliot's arrival. Then he continued whatever discussion he had been having with the incubus.

"…and that's when I left, if you have to know everything that happens around here," Blood said in a continuation of whatever Elliot had missed.

"Really? She said that?" Nightmare smirked. "Looks like Boris has some competition!" he sang. Then he coughed up blood.

…

Eventually, Tara and Emma decided to actually get some sleep. Luckily, it had been an extraordinarily long time period so far, so they would probably get adequate rest. Tara and Emma had decided to share the room Tara had been staying in. Emma didn't want to overburden her hosts, after all.

Unbeknownst to Emma, just as she was falling asleep, a worried Boris was finally drifting off as well.

…

Looking around the colorful landscape, Boris immediately knew where he was. "So I actually managed to fall asleep," he muttered. "Nightmare?" he called. The incubus had to be around somewhere.

Somewhere, Nightmare was. That somewhere was shortly right in front of the feline teen.

"Emma's gone," a miserable Boris told Nightmare.

"She's safe," Nightmare assured him.

Boris' eye lit up at the news. "Great! Where is she? I need to apologize, ASAP!"

"She's with the Hatters."

"You call that _safe_?"

"Don't get your no-longer-existent-tail in a twist, Boris. She plans to return soon – tomorrow, I believe."

Boris sighed in relief. "I still can't believe I let you talk me into letting you wave your little fairy wand and make my tail disappear, though," he said. Boris still held a grudge about that.

"Hey!" Nightmare exclaimed defensively. "You needed to fit in somehow in that world!" He coughed a little at the overexertion.

"At an amusement park?" Boris argued. "Nobody would've looked at me twice! Why didn't you tell me where you were sending me _beforehand_?"

"Because it's so much more fun my way," Nightmare answered truthfully. "Anyhow, that's not all I wanted to talk to you about," he added.

"What?" Boris asked suspiciously.

"You just might have some competition, little kitty," Nightmare teased.

"Huh?"

"You know, Emma?"

"Emma… competition…" Boris mumbled, trying to piece things together. "Oh crud, who?" he yelled at the incubus.

Nightmare only smirked at the teen as the dream world faded around Boris.

***Latte patterns: I am so out of touch of the world, I had no idea about this, and I think it's pretty neat. This here is straight out of the Wikipedia page for latte: "****Increasingly common in the United States and Europe, ****latte art**** has led to the stylization of coffee making, and the creation of what is now a popular art form. Created by pouring steaming, and mostly frothed, milk into the coffee, that liquid is introduced into the beverage in such a way, patterns are distinguishable on the top of coffee. Popular patterns can include hearts, flowers, trees and other forms of simplistic representations of images and objects". Kind of cool, right?**

****Oh, what's life without making fun of Justin Bieber? I swear, he's so much fun to tease!**


	15. Chapter 15

Listen up, everyone! Due to certain circumstances, I have to reduce my workload. Therefore, I am giving my story up for adoption. I will be surprised if even one reader asks to adopt my story, but if there are multiple contenders, I will hand my story over to the writer whose writing style I find fits the story best. Please note that I will still continue my other story for HNKNA, which is a collaborative effort between me and the amazing Space Whales, who puts up with a partner-in-crime such as myself. Thank you so much for making my story, though not popular, more popular than I thought it would become. I am indebted to you guys for boosting my confidence as a writer.

Blood: *quietlty* Thank goodness she's gone

Tara: *jabs with elbow* *glare*

Emma: Be nice!

Fantastical: *sniff* I'll miss you guys, but it's for the best.

McKenzie: *pats Fantastical on shoulder* We know, we know

Blood: *to readers* LISTEN UP! IF YOU PROMISE TO GIVE ME DOUBLE WORD TIME, I'LL USE MY MAFIA INFLUENCE TO GET YOU APPONITED NEWEST AUTHOR OF THIS STORY.

Tara: *seethes* BLOOD…

Fantastical: It's okay. I don't think anybody really cares enough about this to make a deal with Blood. By the way, why are all you guys wearing black?

Emma: *frankly* We're in mourning.

Tara *stares at Blood, who is dressed as usual* Well, most of us.

Peter: Though we regret our leaving you, we admit it's time to say adieu.

Ace: *crying* It's… so… _hard_! *hands a pastry to Fantastical* Here- *sniff* it's my parting gift.

Vivaldi: Those are _our_ tarts! You thieving moron,_ confess_!

Ace: Hehe!

McKenzie: *glare* Criminal acts are unforgivable!

Emma: I agree; stealing is immoral. Apologize!

Ace: *tauntingly and rythmically* The queen of hearts, she made some tarts, all on a summer's day! The knave of hearts, he stole those tarts, and took them quite away!

Fantastical: Well, that's it, folks!

Cadell: I feel so left out of this.


	16. Chapter 16

Well, I've been gone for a while. Duh. Also, nobody wants to adopt my story – what is up with that? I apologize if this isn't particularly entertaining to read, but I just want to spew some information for now and see what replies I get from all of you guys in the reviews. I was wondering why I disappeared from Fanfiction after I cut this story to make time for my collaboration. Well, after doing some reading of old messages, I discovered that my partner had gone missing and I had simply forgotten after waiting around with no stimulation to return. I'm thinking about coming back, but I would have to read my own story a million times over to remember enough about it to continue. Also, I started this when I was in seventh grade or something. I think I was pretty good for a middle school brat, but I was still a middle school brat. Ergo, this isn't my best work in the world. I was thinking of starting a new story that would follow the same idea, but the fresh start would allow me to do some better writing. I was always very flattered by the encouragement I received in this project. Please excuse rambling or incoherence – I had to type this and jam. But anyway, what do you guys think I should do?


End file.
